


Deeply Wired

by Ciocco



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: (towards the end at least), AU, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, alternative universe, android!au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-17
Updated: 2017-11-14
Packaged: 2018-12-30 21:29:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 30,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12117597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ciocco/pseuds/Ciocco
Summary: It’s 2904. A mechanician known as the Doctor finds a broken android, Rose, and decides to take it with him and fix it. The two become closer quickly but soon a mysterious virus inside Rose starts acting up and revealing its true capabilities, changing everything.When Rose’s previous owner comes around and tries to get a hold of the Bad Wolf virus, the two are left with no choice. What lengths will they go to keep Rose away from the evil hands of the Master?





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This is my second attempt at fic writing. As some of you might know, I’m really into the android!au I’ve had around for some time. I have a full story planned, but I’m doing a test chapter of sorts to see if people are interested at all in this sort of thing. More will come if this catches off ~  
> Also a huge thanks to @wordsintimeandspace on tumblr for being the beta for this chapter, she really helped me make this thing readable. Huzzah!
> 
> Additional: I don't know how to post on Ao3 so the tags might be a mess and something might be missing. Hit me up if that's the case!

 

It wasn’t until the Doctor couldn’t see his surroundings properly that he realised how truly late it was. And when it was getting too dark to see, even an idiot knew what to do:  _stay out of the streets._

The Doctor wasn’t planning on getting robbed by a bunch of delinquents just because he’d forgotten the time while collecting spare parts in the scrapyard.

Rushing through the sea of mechanical parts and rusting pipes, something light caught the Doctor’s attention. Upon taking a closer look the light object turned out to be a limb, an arm to be precise.

The arm wasn’t alone either, he quickly noticed. Another similar looking arm and, more shockingly, a whole leg, were lying around in just a five feet radius.

The parts looked human, which would’ve been rather alarming, but the Doctor quickly realised that wasn’t the case. A wave of pure anger struck him as he realised the parts belonged to an android instead.

Following the trail of broken parts, the Doctor quickly found a lifeless torso of a female android, eyes empty and hollow. Kneeling, the Doctor examined the damaged AI.

“Who has left you here all alone?” the Doctor murmured to himself, brushing back the android’s dirty blonde hair to read its model number.

 _RO-53_. A model that was already outdated and replaced by its successor, RO-54. A common service unit. It was already bad enough that someone had just… abandoned this life form in a scrapyard like a piece of trash, but to make the matters worse, that someone had clearly ripped off the android’s limbs as well.

The Doctor couldn’t say he was surprised, really; the AI were widely seen as lesser life forms around the city and many people thought all they were good for was humankind’s dirty work. It still angered him, though. These modern androids were so well-evolved that they were capable of writing their own code and personality. They belonged alongside people, not… not in some dirty scrapyard. Especially this RO-53 unit. As far as he could see there was nothing wrong with it. That is, if someone hadn’t torn it to pieces.

“Let’s take you home, shall we?” The Doctor smiled sadly at the android, picking up the torso and limbs one by one. The Doctor couldn’t find the RO-53’s right leg, but he was positive he could craft one at his workshop.

 

————————–

 

Usually fixing and tinkering with these sort of things took the Doctor only a day: he was rather brilliant, after all. Fixing this particular android turned out to be harder than he had anticipated, though.

He began by running a scan on the android, confirming that the insides weren’t badly damaged. However, things started slowing down when the Doctor connected RO-53 to his computer and ran another scan on her. He found small anomalies encoded into her system. All the memory data had been manually cleared out of the android’s chip, too. There was absolutely no indication of the AI’s previous owner, but the Doctor was ready to bet his money that it was them who had wiped out the memory data in order to stay untraceable. The thought made the Doctor frown in disgust.

He absolutely hated how selfish the humankind could be.

The next day the Doctor reconnected RO-53’s limbs to its body and repaired the outdated energy circuits, some which were poking out from under its shell. The android’s skin was soft and human looking, yet darker patches of stringy looking material kept the Doctor from mistaking her as human. He thought RO-53 looked absolutely beautiful. She might’ve been an older model, but the Doctor still admired the detail put into the android. It was astonishing, to say the least.

 

————————–

 

It was three days later when the Doctor finally finished fixing the RO-53 unit.

Now there was only one step left and that was rebooting the android’s system. Then – if the Doctor had done is work right – she would wake up and be fully functional. He hoped the small anomalies in the android’s coding wouldn’t be anything preventing it from working properly. They hadn’t been removable, after all. The Doctor smiled despite himself. It was time to wake her up.

A long, high noise emitted from the android as the Doctor restored its power. Silence fell after that. The Doctor held his breath, waiting for something to happen.

The android didn’t move.

Then, suddenly: “Restarting: artificial cooling system. Powering the system.”

The Doctor’s eyes lit up. It was working! The android… no,  _she_ , she was working!

The Doctor followed the android’s reawakening with excitement and curiosity. Soon, the AI’s eyes fluttered open, revealing a pair of whiskey brown, confused eyes. They looked hauntingly real. The Doctor found himself unable to look away.

There was a silence as the Doctor waited for the android to gather her surroundings. Finally, her eyes settled on the Doctor, just staring with open curiosity. The Doctor couldn’t hold back a goofy smile.

“Hullo there,” he greeted gently. The RO-53 continued to stare at him, silent yet listening.

“…Hello.” The android’s voice was young but tentative in tone. She was clearly disoriented. The Doctor didn’t blame her. She was, after all, devoid of all her memory data. There was nothing to grasp onto.

“I’m the Doctor—”

“Hello, Doctor,” the android replied before he could finish, then falling silent. “…Sorry. That was hello twice,” she noted. The Doctor laughed in a good-natured manner.

“No need to apologise. What I was saying was that I’m the Doctor. As in, that’s my name, not my profession. I’m a human and a mechanician.” RO-53 nodded, looking out of place.

“You must be confused, and that’s because you are suffering from a memory loss of sorts. But it’s okay, I’m a friend,” the Doctor assured, and something in the android’s eyes shifted. The uncertainty and hint of fear the Doctor had detected earlier were gone. She absolutely fascinated the Doctor.

“What’s my name?” the android asked, curious. Her head tilted a bit to the side.

“…Your name?” the Doctor deadpanned.

“Yes, my name. All humans have names, don’t they? So, what’s mine?” she inquired, stopping the Doctor dead in his tracks.

_She thinks she’s human._

“I, uh…”  _RO-53_. That was a bit of an impersonal name. He couldn’t tell her that.

“…It’s Rose. Your name is Rose,” he slipped before he could think twice.

The android’s eyes widened in a curious manner and a smile tugged her lips. “Rose? Yes, that’s it. I’m Rose,” she concluded.

“Wait, no, actually—,” the Doctor started.  _She wasn’t human_. He shouldn’t mislead her like that. But then he glanced into the android’s eyes and found himself unable to correct her. It was a cruel world out there. Androids weren’t treated well. He… he couldn’t just… He wanted to protect this AI from that. Maybe if he just…

“—that’s right. I’m the Doctor and you are Rose, my good friend. Yup, that’s it!”

Rose smiled wide and the Doctor smiled back, knowing he’d made a mistake.

He didn’t feel too guilty, though.


	2. First chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First chapter after the prologue is here! I’m having a lot of fun with this story! This chapter was beta’d by the lovely @wordsintimeandspace and @starlightkissedsmiles (from tumblr)! They’re golden <3

 

“So how did we meet?”

“We… what?”

“Us. How did we meet each other? I can’t remember,” Rose specified. The android was circling around the Doctor’s workshop, discovering her surroundings. She kept fidgeting with the hem of her newly obtained tank top the Doctor had clothed her with. There had been a slight awkward moment between the two when Rose had realised she had no clothes on and the Doctor had had no good explanation for that. Rose didn’t seem to think the Doctor was some kind of pervert, though, and he was endlessly thankful for that.

“Uh… We didn’t, actually,” the Doctor answered. “I found you unconscious, outside. Um… without your… clothes.”

“Oh. So that’s why I had nothing on,” Rose concluded. A frown formed between her eyebrows, crumbling her beautiful face. “...Was I…?”

Was she what? _Oh._

“No! No, I don’t think so. I… I didn’t find anything that would indicate… _that_.” The Doctor swallowed. No, she hadn’t been sexually assaulted. She had, however, been torn to pieces like a child’s toy. The Doctor couldn’t tell her that, though. Not after incorrectly telling her that she was human.

Now Rose was brushing her hand along the Doctor’s workbench, wandering aimlessly. She simply nodded, still unsettled, but believing.

“So we didn’t know each other before,” Rose stated. The Doctor smiled despite himself: Rose’s independent programming was already writing its own code based on the information she had been given. It was good - that meant everything was working as intended - but it made the Doctor feel bad for lying to Rose. Now she was constantly interpreting the new data she gathered in a way that would strengthen her idea of being human, and the lie couldn’t hold together forever. At some point she’d realise it herself.

“Why did you help me, then? How come you said we’re friends, when we didn’t know each other before?” she questioned, not really looking at the Doctor as much as exploring her surroundings. The Doctor, who had been passively following Rose’s movements around his workshop, straightened his stance defensively.

“I’m the Doctor, it’s what I do. I help people,” he answered swiftly, pride and passion apparent in his voice. “Maybe we just met recently, but that doesn’t mean anything to me. Besides. I’m a lonely man,” he quipped with a grin, then stopping dead in his tracks when he saw Rose’s eyebrows rising to her hairline. “No, that came out wrong. I meant I’m lonely and in a need of a _friend_.”

Rose laughed at that, making the Doctor feel better about himself. Soon, the female android walked up to the Doctor, her full lips stretched into a beautiful smile. Before the Doctor knew it, he was embraced in a hug.

“Thank you,” Rose whispered, voice as warm as her body.

It felt unreal, to say the least. The Doctor had worked with many androids in his life, but he had never really hugged one. It felt strangely right. Rose’s body was warm and soft and not at all inhuman. She had an unique scent, even, something the Doctor had never thought about androids possessing. In that moment, the Doctor wondered why people thought so badly of the AI. Rose was just kind and had no prejudices about the world around her. Well. She was a blank slate when it came to experience, which was why the Doctor had been able to talk them into a difficult situation. He was sure that this RO-53 had been just as kind prior to her memory wipe though.

Rose broke the hug first, looking sheepish and shuffling awkwardly before smiling up and taking a full step back. The Doctor found himself missing the pressure of the android’s embrace.

“So, uh…” Rose hesitated.  
“What is it?” The Doctor asked at once, bringing his hand up to his wild mane of hair.

“I was just wondering,” Rose started, not looking at the Doctor, “since I don’t really have anyone.”

“Yeah?” The Doctor almost knew where this was going and he had zero objections to it. Quite the opposite, he was trying to keep his voice as level as possible to not come off as an eager puppy.

“Could I stay here?”

The Doctor’s mouth stretched into a wondrous smile, his eyes crinkling from the corners: “Oh, yes! Absolutely!” he nodded, feeling overjoyed.

“Of course that is until my family finds me. They must be looking for me already,” Rose realised, making the Doctor’s smile waver for a different reason. “If I have a family, that is,” she laughed nervously. The Doctor had to away.

_Androids do not have families._

Of course, he couldn’t tell her that. Seeing Rose talk about such small things made the Doctor feel guilty for not being honest with her from the get-go. It was very unlikely Rose even had friends. She was a common service unit: produced for people’s owning specifically, as much as the Doctor hated that. And while some AI had families and friends, they were always self-formed and the legal system didn’t acknowledge them as valid.

The Doctor plastered on a smile a bit too wide for his reply: “Yeah, of course.”

Rose seemed to detect the Doctor’s hesitation, as she was now frowning herself.

“Are you okay, Doctor?” _Oh_ , she had the cutest British accent. That was quite rare to hear in this day and age. He hadn’t really paid attention to it before.

No, wait. She asked something. He should probably answer.

“Oh, yes! Molto bene! You know me, a lonely man. I just got so excited to hear you wanted to stay around!” Rose smiled at that but the Doctor wasn’t done letting his big mouth ramble.

“And you know, not having a family is perfectly normal, too! I don’t have a family, even. So that’s just how life goes sometimes, but it’d make us quite the pair, wouldn’t it?”

Rose laughed: “Yeah. I suppose it would.”

 

\--------------------------

 

A few days went by after that. The Doctor went on with his usual work routines every day while also talking with Rose, who was extremely interested in all his works, especially the silly ones. The sonic screwdriver, a wibbly wobbly gadget and a walking toaster. He liked doing little experiments in between his actual job, fixing people’s machinery. The Doctor also very much enjoyed having Rose around; she was cheerful, kind, funny, and considerate. Getting around some things like eating (androids didn’t eat organic food) or sleeping (androids didn’t really sleep in the way humans did) was a bit difficult, but he managed to get around them just fine without telling any more lies than he already had. And Rose did seem content. It was around half a week after her arrival that Rose’s enthusiasm started morphing into something darker.

“I feel like I’m in your way here, doing nothing useful,” she revealed one day as the Doctor was tinkering with his bits and bobs, her sitting on a desk just like she had done every day. The Doctor frowned at Rose’s words.

“Oh no, I don’t mind at all.” She didn’t seem too convinced.

“Hey, if you’re concerned about being a liability, you could always help me around here and there. I could really use a second pair of hands, you know,” the Doctor suggested. Rose’s expression opened up.

“Really? Like, I’d be your… assistant?”  
“If you want, yeah,” he shrugged. The android was now grinning wide, any hints of melancholy clear from her face.

“Yes!”

“That settles it, then,” smiled the Doctor. Rose was in a good mood once again, but deep down the Doctor knew that he couldn’t keep it that way forever.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor was busy working with a broken toaster and Rose was nowhere to be seen. She had just been by his side a moment ago, but so concentrated on the toaster, the Doctor didn’t really catch her departure soon enough. When he heard vague noises and someone closing the door, though, he was brought back to the real world. She hadn’t left outside, had she?

Before the Doctor could panic, Rose was already back in his line of sight, glancing behind her back. When she saw the Doctor, her expression changed.

“What’s up with your face?” she asked walking in, looking at the Doctor’s dumbfounded face with amusement.

“What? Nothing, I just lost a thought,” he recovered quickly, feeling internally relieved. Rose grinned, taking the bait.  
“Well, I’ve got to help you find it, then. ‘s my job now,” she joked, poking her tongue out between her teeth.

The Doctor laughed at that before remembering about the noise.

“Were you outside just now? I heard the door.”

“Oh. Yeah, sorry, no,” Rose shook her head. “A man came by and I opened the door ‘cause you were busy. I meant to tell you right away but you were making a funny face,” Rose chuckled. The Doctor didn’t laugh, however. He wasn’t supposed to have any visitors this week.

“What kind of man?” the Doctor asked, feeling uneasy. Rose didn’t seem worried at all, oblivious to the Doctor’s change of mood. Rose shrugged.  
“Thought you’d know him or something. He was all… blonde and wearing a hoodie.”

“No, I don’t know anyone by that description,” the Doctor said slowly, looking over at Rose. “What did he want?”  
“Nothing. Just asked me if we’d met somewhere before. I told him I couldn’t remember. Then he asked if you were home; I told him you were just around the corner. And then... then he just left? He was a bit weird, actually. I was already thinking he knew me but then he just goes without saying a word.” That did nothing to ease the Doctor’s worries, but he couldn’t do anything about them, either. Just knowing that this interaction had occurred without him being present made him feel more protective than he should. Rose was clearly more disappointed by the man seemingly not being someone relevant to her past, though.

“Okay. Just… if someone like that comes by again, let me know, yeah?” His fears were probably totally irrational and had nothing to do with anything. It was likely he felt on the edge just because the man had seemed to recognise Rose.

“I just did,” was Rose’s answer. It was hard to argue after that one. She was right, after all.

 

\--------------------------

 

“What happened to your toe?” Rose casually asked as the Doctor walked into the cramped kitchen space only wearing his striped pajamas.

“It’s a funny story, really,” the Doctor laughed. “It got cut off when I was eleven.”

Rose didn’t look too amused.

“Oh. Sounds… real funny?” she replied, clearly waiting for an explanation of some kind.

“Now that I think of it, it wasn’t really funny at all. It was a machine-related accident, just a minor thing. But it did hurt like _pears_!” the Doctor giggled, wiggling his cybernetic toe around.

It wasn’t really uncommon to get cybernetic prosthetics for a missing appendix like a toe or a finger. Sure, cybernetic arms and legs and hell, even whole torsos, were more life-changing, but a human with an enhanced robotic attachment or prosthesis was something you’d see on the streets very frequently. And in the Doctor’s case he’d been just a kid and having all his toes in place had felt crucial back then. Now it was just funny to look back at the small toe and ponder life.

“Okay, I take your word for it,” Rose nodded. She didn’t need any further details about the incident.

The Doctor made himself breakfast pancakes. Rose followed the process from the side, interested.

“Funny how I still don’t feel hungry,” Rose mused. The Doctor laughed dryly, trying to keep it light.  
“Haha yeah, funny, that.”

“Are you sure there is nothing wrong with me? I should probably eat, shouldn’t I?”

“No, I’m sure you’re fine. Lots of people go days without eating. It’s completely normal,” the Doctor lied in the moment. Small things like this were getting harder and harder to cover. He couldn’t let Rose digest organic food, it would clog her system. At the same time, he could tell Rose was getting suspicious, though. The Doctor kept always making excuses not to go outside, for example. Soon he’d run out of excuses and Rose would want to go outside for real. Outside, the lie wouldn’t hold for long. The bubble had to be burst.

He just wanted to protect her from it.

“Oh, okay,” Rose said, seeming to believe him. It was the worst, when Rose believed him. She probably had all kinds of basic information programmed into her, but she still trusted the Doctor more than herself. He almost hoped she wouldn’t. Covering up one lie was getting exhausting. Then again, he was her only real connection to anything so far. Maybe it was just understandable.

“Hey…” Rose began.

“What is it?”

“Just wondering if we could go outside today. I’m getting bored inside. I mean, I s’pose nothing’s stopping me from going out by myself. It’s just kinda scary, being out there alone, in the...” She laughed nervously. Then her eyes widened. “I… I can’t even remember what city this is. Oh my god, Doctor… what year is it, even? Why do I just _now_ realise this?! There is… there is nothing. Is that even possible?” Rose demanded, her previous mood gone.

“Hey, calm down Rose, it’s okay. Memory losses can be that bad. There is nothing wrong with you,” the Doctor tried to assure, while also tamping down the sinking feeling in his stomach. _She wanted to go outside_. How had he somehow predicted this just moments earlier?

“It’s the year 2904. We’re in New London. It’s all okay,” he said calmly, walking up to Rose that was already looking so miserable. She had been extraordinary calm these past few days. Maybe it was just a matter of time before she started really realising how little she actually knew.

The Doctor offered Rose his hand, which the android took instantly, briefly pursing her lips together: “What month is it? June?”

“September,” corrected the Doctor, preparing himself for what he was about to say next. Seeing Rose get so lost so quickly was hurting him, too. “We’ll go out today. Together. To visit some places and see if you remember them.” Rose’s grip on the Doctor’s hand tightened. She was silent for a moment.

“...What if I won’t?”  
The Doctor frowned: “Won’t what?”

“Remember. If I won’t remember. What then?” Rose was genuinely concerned.

“Then you won’t,” the Doctor simply answered, making Rose’s worry line between her brows deepen. “And it’s okay if you don’t. Then you just make new memories,” he continued, trying to get Rose to think of the positive side of things.

Rose was still looking rather troubled, but she did smile at that, squeezing the Doctor’s hand.

“Yeah.” Her expression cleared up the tiniest bit as she continued: “Yeah, that sounds alright.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is no specific rate for the updates so the chapters will drop as I get them done. I know that's a bit annoying for you readers, but I hope you're able to understand. This chapter I was able to finish quicker than I anticipated, though!
> 
> Thank you for reading my story, reviews are always appreciated <3


	3. Second chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter gets a bit darker. Not much, but a bit.  
> Beta’d by @wordsintimeandspace and @starlightkissedsmiles (from tumblr)

Check out this AMAZING fic art [megabadbunny](http://www.megabadbunny.tumblr.com) made for me **[HERE](http://megabadbunny.tumblr.com/post/165625084471/what-if-i-wont-the-doctor-frowned-wont) ** (seriously, I'm not sugar coating how amazing it is)

* * *

 

 

The weather was brisk and cloudy as the Doctor and Rose stepped outside. The sidewalks were deluged with leaves of all the colours of autumn. Rose, securely holding the Doctor’s hand, was absolutely in awe of the world. She admired the way her red converse shoes got lost in the sea of colours. Well, the Doctor’s converse shoes, really. Rose didn’t own her own clothes so the Doctor had her borrow some of his own. Most of the items she wore were adorably baggy on her.

“It’s like we’re walking on flames,” Rose squealed, kicking the dry leaves around with her feet. The Doctor simply smiled, looking at the pure wonder on the android’s face. Letting go of the Doctor’s hand, Rose began sprinting along the sidewalk, looking around.

“It’s so chilly!” she observed excitedly, swirling around. A few pedestrians eyed the pair warily, but Rose was completely oblivious to them.

She came back to the Doctor with a spring in her step, absolutely glowing.

“Your nose is all red!” Rose laughed, pointing at the Doctor’s nose.

“So is yours,” he replied with a lopsided grin, wondering how the effect was achieved on an android that didn’t have a circulatory system. Rose became rather tranquil after that. Taking the Doctor’s hand once again, Rose fell into a peaceful walking rhythm alongside him. A comfortable silence accompanied them, but the smile on Rose’s face persisted.

“So? What’s the plan?” she asked after a while, looking around in a curious manner.

“I was thinking we could go buy you some clothes of your own,” the Doctor revealed. His clothes did suit her but they were a tad too big. Never mind the fact that his trousers were too tight for her wider hips, forcing her to wear his striped pajama pants instead.

“I don’t have any money,” Rose said, frowning.

“Well lucky for you, I’m buying.”   
The android’s eyebrows spiked up.

“What, really?”  
“Yup,” smiled the Doctor as he popped his lips, “with one condition. We’ll be done by noon. Shopping isn’t my favourite thing.”

“Deal!” Rose nodded, excited. Her enthusiasm of such small things warmed the Doctor’s heart. She was discovering the world all over again and the Doctor got to see it first-hand.

It was amazing.

 

————————–

 

The deal was doomed to fail, of course. It took them until two o’clock in the afternoon to be done. Finally, Rose had settled on a carmine zip up hoodie and a pair of tight-fitting skinny jeans among a collection of other clothing. The Doctor didn’t mind, though. He was just happy to see the android so excited for having her own accessories. It seemed to distract her completely from the frowny looks the shop assistant kept giving them.

With her clothes on, it wasn’t as obvious Rose wasn’t human. However, people did get suspicious seeing her. The Doctor was quite sure the salesperson had seen a glimpse of Rose’s bare back when she had been changing, making it apparent she was an AI. It was generally frowned upon, seeing an android in a shop meant for people. There weren’t laws against it, but it was kind of an unspoken rule that the AI only shopped in the more poor parts of the town, where most of the boutiques were run by the androidkind.

They exited the shop, Rose wearing her new clothes with a newfound smile on her face. She wasn’t paying much attention to the Doctor, distracted by all the new things around her.

Soon the Doctor and Rose passed a ragged looking android huddled up against a building, begging for money. Its eyes were sunken and its fingers were clearly mechanical looking. Not even artificial skin was covering them. Before the Doctor could stop her, Rose was already talking to the beggar.

“Are you okay? Why are you outside in the cold?” Rose asked, naive. The android lifted its head, looking at Rose with what the Doctor could only label as confusion. It let out a string of minor key machinery sounds in response. Rose frowned, not understanding.

“Why are you here? Can I help you somehow? What… what do you need? I can‒,” she asked, kneeling in front of the deprived AI, as the Doctor laid his hand on Rose’s shoulder.  
“Rose, it’s no use. We can’t help him.”

Rose looked at the Doctor with a deep concern and confusion apparent in her eyes.

“What do you mean? We’ve got to help him. Please,” Rose argued, persistent. The Doctor sighed.

“He’s a… There are a lot of them. Homeless androids. We can’t help them all,” he tried to explain. Rose’s frown got deeper and passion flashed in her eyes.

“We can help  _him_. We can’t just… walk past and do nothing!” Turning back to the rickety android, Rose removed the Doctor’s borrowed jacket from herself, leaving her only in her new hoodie. She gave the homeless android the jacket all the while reassuring that it would be okay. The Doctor felt a sense of pride well up inside him upon Rose’s kind-heartedness.

Unlike Rose’s era of androids that had a natural resemblance of a person, the older generation of androids were a lot more machine-like and not so soft in appearance. They were more primitive and many (humans and androids alike, the Doctor had noted) considered them stupid because they weren’t able to learn or understand modern day languages. Nowadays most of them were in the same state as this individual, poor and on the streets, basically invisible to the citizen. The Doctor had already accepted their existence as a sad fact, but Rose, as seen, wasn’t going to let it go as easily. Of course she saw the poor beings in need of help. She, in the Doctor’s opinion, was the most human android he had ever met. Heck, she was the most human  _being_  he had ever met.

“Will you be okay? I can… I don’t know how to help you, but if you need anything at all…” Rose was talking to the android, holding it’s metallic hand gently between her own.

“Rose‒,” the Doctor began, only to be met with a flashing look of anger.  _She was mad at him._ The Doctor sighed, taking out his wallet. He took out fifty pounds and offered them to Rose.

“Give this to him,” he nodded at the android. Rose looked at the Doctor, surprised, before taking the money and turning to the AI once again.  
“Here. Take these. I… we can’t do more, but I hope it helps you even a bit,” Rose gave the bills to the tramp. When the android didn’t respond, Rose glanced back at the Doctor with worry in her eyes. He smiled sadly and shook his head. The older androids only knew their programmed in code language. It was why not even most of the androidkind considered the older era robots to be a part of the society.

Rose looked at her converse clad feet before inhaling and standing up, starting to turn away from the android. Before she could go far, though, a cold grip on her wrist stopped her. The Doctor was ready to step between the android and Rose in case it was trying to hurt her, but instead… it just met Rose’s gaze, looking at her. Rose, too, was confused when nothing happened. Then, slowly, its mechanical jaw activated, opening. A rusty sound emitted from it.

“…ZzzBt, than k_ yoU. W_olf…BEep.”

“…Anytime,” Rose answered with sincere confusion, squeezing the bot’s hand before letting go.

Had the Doctor been sitting on a chair, he would’ve fallen. The sudden turn in the interaction was something the Doctor hadn’t expected in a million years.

 

————————–

 

“Why’d you say it’s no use?”

They were making their way towards the riverside as Rose finally asked what had been hanging between them since their encounter with the old AI. The Doctor sighed.

“It’s… It’s complicated, between humans and the AI,” he offered.  
“I don’t understand.”

“I know. Me neither, really. It’s just that some people think that the AI are lesser because they are, well…  _artificial_.”

“Is there some rule against helping the androids, then?” Rose questioned. The Doctor shook his head.

“No. It’s just that… uh, how do I explain this? There are two kinds of androids. The one we saw was an older era android. They built those back in the day when the nanotechnology wasn’t so advanced. Nowadays, androids look just like us human folk. The older era androids are at the bottom of everything; not even other androids care about them. When I said ‘Rose, it’s no use’, I didn’t mean about you wanting to help him. What I meant was that those androids are literally unable to understand human languages such as English. That’s why I thought talking to it…  _him_ , was no use.” Rose’s expression was more puzzled and less accusing now.

“He answered me, though. How’s that possible if he didn’t understand me?” Rose wondered.

“I don’t know. That’s what surprised me as well,” the Doctor replied, looking up at the sky.

“…It’s… it’s not fair, though,” Rose said then. Her expression was troubled as the Doctor glanced at her direction.

“Fair?” he repeated.

“You said that all those androids - the ones that look and talk just like us - even they just… abandoned their ancestors. Why’d they do that?”

The Doctor looked at the ground, not really able to meet Rose’s answer seeking eyes.

“They don’t see them as people, I suppose,” he answered. What was valued as life went a long way back. Thousands of years of history, and always there were those who were seen as less. All that pointless hatred and the prejudices were hard to explain to someone so innocent. “Just like humans don’t see androids as people,” the Doctor added.

“What do you mean?” Rose sounded defensive all of a sudden. She saw everyone as people, of course.

“The popular belief among the humankind is that humans created androids and thus are superior. Many don’t think androids should have the same rights as humans, and at the moment they don’t, actually. The same goes for androids and the first generation of androids. Except that  _nobody_  sees the first generation of androids as intelligent, self-aware beings.”

There was a silence after that, during which Rose was digesting everything the Doctor had just dropped on her. Finally, she spoke.

“They are still living beings, aren’t they, though? We can’t just treat them like they… Like they don’t matter.” Her voice was quiet. Almost desperate.

“I know, Rose,” The Doctor sighed, “trust me. I know.”

 

————————–

 

Leaving the heavy stuff behind them wasn’t easy, but the Doctor was able to distract Rose by taking her to a retro comic book shop. She absolutely loved the old comics, yellow papers and blotchy colouring. After a while the shop had been thoroughly seen, though.

“What now?” Rose asked as they walked hand in hand down the street. It made him uneasy, holding hands in public with an android. Many people - even androids themselves - were against human/android friendships and relationships. The two species’ terms were quite strained on both sides.

“We could visit some of the more older things in this city. I was thinking we could walk along Thames and go see the London Eye.”

“The London Eye?” Rose repeated with a question.

“Yeah. It’s a ferris wheel they built all the way back in the year 1999. It’s been there for almost a thousand years, making it one of New London’s oldest remaining tourist attractions,” he explained. Rose listened to the Doctor in awe.

“Can we ride it?” she wondered. The Doctor chuckled.

“No, it was permanently closed in the early 2500s. But it is very beautiful. I think you’d like it.”

“Oh, I want to see it, then!” Rose exclaimed, already one step ahead of the Doctor.

 

————————–

 

The London Eye turned out to be a success. Rose was absolutely blown away by its size. It was actually quite small compared to the ferris wheels they had nowadays, but still, it was so old it was weird to think it had stood there for almost a millennium.

After the London Eye the pair visited other popular places such as the remnants of Big Ben, the clock tower, and New London’s oldest remaining pub, The Prospect of Whitby. You couldn’t get inside the pub but it was a great attraction regardless.

They were walking along the riverside as the clock was starting to near six. The city was as busy as ever, yet the two found a peace in their walk.

“It’s been such a nice day,” Rose sighed with a smile. She swung their intertwined hands between them.

“Yeah, it certainly has,” agreed the Doctor, squeezing the android’s palm. There was a moment of silence between them.

“I didn’t remember anything, though,” Rose continued, staring ahead. The Doctor sighed, reinforcing his grip on her hand.

“I’m sorry you don’t remember,” he answered, genuinely sorry for her. It had been a nice day indeed, but nothing could quite distract Rose from her missing memory. That’s why the Doctor was surprised to hear the change in Rose’s tone of voice when she answered:  
“…I think that’s okay. I… This has been the most beautiful and fulfilling day I can remember having. I’ve had so many new experiences today… with you. It has been amazing. So… it’s not a bad start if I never end up remembering.” She sounded more at peace than the Doctor had ever heard her when talking about her lack of memories. It made him smile.

“I’m glad to hear that.”

The two continued their walk in comfortable silence after that. Finding comfort in each other’s grip, the Doctor felt like it was them against the world. It felt so good, having someone at his side.

At last, it was getting too late to stay outside. The Doctor suggested heading back and taking the tube to travel back to his workshop. Her hand securely in his, the two strolled towards the station. The Doctor would’ve lied if he said he wasn’t on the edge a bit. Walking out late was always dangerous. It was only when they passed a darker alley that things went wrong rapidly.

There was a loud bang, shouting, cursing. Rose’s hand slipped from the Doctor’s as someone yanked him to the side. His head forcefully hit the brick wall, making stars erupt before his eyes. The Doctor could hear Rose shouting his name from a small distance.

“Why are you keeping this filthy human in your company, sister?” It was a woman that was speaking, rough and angered, so close to the Doctor’s face that it had to be the voice of the person holding him against the wall.

“I… what are you doing? Let him go! We don’t even know you!” he heard Rose shouting, confused.

“Is this man your owner?” a lower voice demanded. The Doctor’s field of vision started clearing a bit, and he could see a group of people between Rose and himself. One of them was the woman holding him forcefully against the bricks.

“My  _what_? What are you… No, he’s my friend!” Rose answered. She tried to push her way through the man and a couple other people standing between them, but they didn’t let her.

“You’re friends with a human? Are you crazy, sister?” asked the same low voice, holding Rose back. The way they talked to Rose… this had to be a gang of radical androids. Freedom fighters, they called themselves. Delinquents was what they really were. Shit. Shit shit shit.

“I don’t know you! What do you mean, ‘with a human’? We’re both human! Now let us go!” A silence fell after that and the Doctor realised that it was the exact moment things were going to blow up right in his face.

_Shit._

“Human? She thinks she’s a  _human_?” asked the female android holding the Doctor. She sounded disgusted, outraged. The Doctor felt her grip on his arms tighten like a vice. “Brother,  _show her_.”

_No._

The male android stepped up, blocking the Doctor’s view, but soon there was a loud crunching sound of something being ripped off.

_No._

_**“ROSE!!”** _

Someone was shouting. Was it him? The female holding him muffled his shout with her arm. Silence. The Doctor could only watch as the male android stepped aside, revealing a shocked looking Rose staring at her right hand. Or rather, where her right hand used to be.

It all happened so fast. It was like a blur of motion, seeing everything fold out. There was rapid movement all of a sudden. The androids holding him and Rose apart released them, scrambling away as new people came at the scene. The street police, the Doctor faintly realised. They had probably heard his shout, that’s what it must’ve been.

They didn’t stay to make sure the Doctor was okay, they just went after to chase the delinquents, leaving the two there standing in shock.

There was a haunting silence as both of them stared at Rose’s missing arm. Wires and bits were sticking out from the end of it, emitting occasional sparks from their damaged ends.

“…D-Doctor?” Rose slowly looked up at the Doctor, betrayal imminent in her slightly glistening eyes. He swallowed slowly. There was nothing to do. The bomb had been dropped.

“Rose, it… I can explain‒,” the Doctor began lamely, but it was useless.

She had already fled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now I have a busy week ahead of me so you shouldn't expect a new chapter from me no earlier than next weekend, and even that isn't possible yet. What I do know though is that there will be another chapter, this fic is ongoing and I'm not leaving it hanging as long as people are interested in hearing the story :D
> 
> Also oops sorry for the cliffhanger ;P


	4. Third chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woohoo, it's Friday and the time for an update! We left the last chapter off on a cliffhanger... what'll happen next? ;)
> 
> As usual, (this chapter) beta'd by @wordsintimeandpace (from tumblr)

 

* * *

 

A tall shadow of a pinstriped man stretched across the dimly lit sidewalk. The figure was walking with haste, melting into the cold shadows between streetlights. He was clearly not out for a nightly stroll. No, he was searching for something.

_Where could she have gone?_

The Doctor was getting desperate. New London was a huge place. Granted, Rose couldn’t have gone too far with no money, but judging by the fact that the Doctor still hadn’t found her and it was after nightfall… Either she hadn’t stopped walking or he had looked for her in all the wrong places. The Doctor had looked through all the places they had visited earlier that day: the London Eye, the pub, the remnants of Big Ben… Yet he hadn’t caught a single glimpse of her. There was literally no further clues to where she could be. She didn’t know her way around the city. And more importantly, it was dangerous to be out at night. They had already crossed paths with a gang of delinquents but it didn’t mean there wasn’t anything else lurking in the dark.

The Doctor was worried. He knew not telling Rose about her true nature had been a mistake from the beginning, but the lie had got out of hand. Literally out of hand. At some other time it would’ve been a funny pun, but the mental image of someone straight up ripping Rose’s hand off made the Doctor feel nauseous. And now Rose was somewhere here, alone. _In an unstable state of mind._ The Doctor sped up his pace.

 

\--------------------------

 

10:24pm. The Doctor still hadn’t found Rose. By this point any reasonable person would have given up since it was rather obvious that he wasn’t going to find her. He couldn’t just leave her, though. He _wouldn’t._ Frustrated, the Doctor ran his hands through his already wild hair. He was determined to keep searching. If it was dangerous to be out at night for a human like him it sure as hell was dangerous for a female android with a wiped out memory chip. There was no one she could’ve gone to. She didn’t know anyone. Unless…

 _The android_.

She couldn’t have walked all that way back, could she? They had met the poor android miles from the riverside. Could she even remember the path they had taken that accurately?

The answer was probably yes since she was an AI, the Doctor realised. Of course she remembered. It was the only place he hadn’t checked out, too. However, the chance of Rose actually being there was rather slim.

Either way, it was worth trying.

Taking up on the new lead, the Doctor turned around and started jogging back.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor felt a wave of relief when he saw the same old android huddled up in its previous position against the building, clearly not alone. Someone was sitting next to it, seeming to interact with the old android. Soon he was close enough to see clearly the two faces illuminated by the clothes shop’s neon pink, bright letters.

Rose. No doubt, it was her. Same blonde hair, same red hoodie. The Doctor’s exhausted face broke into a relieved smile. He had found her.

His joy was short lived, though. As Rose noticed him approaching her previously kind expression morphed into the same look of betrayal and hurt he had seen moments before she had ran off. The Doctor’s steps halted into a stop.

“Rose, I…” he began, holding up his hands as a peace offering. She was having none of it, though.

“Why’d you come here?” Rose asked. Anger was written all over her face. The Doctor’s heart sank. To be fair, he didn’t know what he had expected. The reception he got was only what he deserved.

“I… I’m sorry, Rose. I’m so, so sorry,” the Doctor apologised sincerely.

“I don’t need your apologies,” Rose announced curtly.

“I know you don’t,” he said, “and I’m not here for your forgiveness. I’m just… I couldn’t leave you, it’s not safe out here. I was worried.” Rose’s expression hardened and the Doctor somehow knew that he had probably said the wrong thing at that moment.

“‘M safe alright. I’ve got him here with me and we get along just fine. Not much to talk about since we don’t understand each other but at least there’s nothing he’s keeping from me,” Rose retorted, making the Doctor feel a bang of guilt. Damn, she knew where to strike when she really wanted to.

“Rose, just… please let me take a look at your hand. I just want to help you,” he tried, gesturing at Rose’s cloth clad hand.

“You want to _help_ me? Really? From what I got, you’re just some human with a god complex and I’m just your newest… your newest project or your bloody _servant_ or…”

It was difficult, seeing Rose so bitter and hurt. He had let her down in the biggest way imaginable, smashed her unswerving faith into pieces. He had tried to protect her; instead he had dug a gaping hole between them. He’d be lucky to ever gain even the smallest amount of her trust back.

“You were never a project, Rose. I’m not like that, you know me and know that I’m not like that.”

“Do I know you, though? I’ve been so stupid this whole time and you just let me. For all I know everything you’ve told me is a lie. For all I know, Rose isn’t even my real name,” Rose spat. Her expression hardened further when the Doctor didn’t answer. The pieces kept falling together fast now that the domino of lies had already began collapsing.

“...What _is_ my real name, Doctor?”

He sighed. He couldn’t defend himself, really. She was right.

“You… you didn’t have a name. Android’s don’t... But you‒,” the Doctor took a deep breath, “‒you did have a model number. Your unit is known as RO-53.” Before Rose could utter a word, the Doctor rushed in: “I just… please, I know you must hate me and I understand if you never ever trust me again and want to get away from me but please please _please_ let me at least fix your hand.”

“...I just want you to leave me alone,” Rose exclaimed, voice worn down. The Doctor could practically feel his heart breaking in two at her words.  
“And I’ll let you. As soon as you let me fix your hand. I feel like I owe that to you.”

Rose was quiet for a while, contemplating. For the first time she seemed to actually consider the Doctor’s words.

“You can really fix my hand?” she asked uncertainly, looking down at the stub of a hand she had covered protectively in her hoodie. She seemed tempted. The Doctor took her hesitation as a cue to continue: “You’ll have to come back to my workshop for that, but yes, yes I can.”

“I…” Rose began, shaking her head and looking down at her hand. A pained look flashed on her face, one she tried to hide from the Doctor. He caught it, though. “I don’t know,” Rose admitted.

“Rose, I promise… If you have even the slightest amount of trust left in you… My intention was never to hurt you and I’m so, so sorry things ended up like this. I would do everything differently if I had a time machine to go back in time with. If you let me fix your hand I will do anything you want. Anything at all.” He didn’t dare move closer to Rose, just standing perfectly still waiting for her response. His eyes never swayed away from the blonde, not even to glance at the rather passive looking android beside her. Rose bit her lip and massaged her wrist as she contemplated the answer.

“...Alright.”

“What?”

“I said alright. I’ll come with you if you promise to fix my hand and not lie to me ever again,” Rose nodded. Relief flooded the Doctor’s system.

“I… yes. Thank you. Brilliant, that is! I will never lie to you again, you can be sure of that. I’ll prove it to you,” the Doctor swore, sounding a bit too enthusiastic. Rose didn’t smile at his excited demeanor. She simply gathered herself, getting up from the ground.

“You fix my hand and we are even. After you’ve done that, you’ll let me go.”

If he thought his heart had broken earlier he’d been wrong. This was it.

Before they took off Rose turned back to look at the old android. It had barely moved during the whole time.

“Thank you for keeping me company,” Rose said, smiling at the AI warmly. The android looked back at Rose with it’s big, sunken eyes and made a low beeping sound in response. It wasn’t clear to the Doctor whether the android had actually understood Rose or not, but he choose to think it had.

The emotion behind Rose’s words was universal, after all.

 

\--------------------------

 

The journey back to the Doctor’s workshop was strained. Silence hung between them in a big, uncomfortable lump, the coldness of it seeping into his bones. The Doctor’s guilt increased with every step taken. The two words tripped out from the tip of his tongue by accident: “ _I’m sorry._ ”

Rose didn’t answer. The Doctor figured she must not want to talk to him. If he was Rose, he’d be the same.

It was past midnight when they finally got back to his workshop. The Doctor, ever the insomniac, felt as awake as ever. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling, though. Upon stepping inside the safety of the workshop, the Doctor found himself unable to think of anything to say. Rose had been quiet all the way since they left the old android, not even looking at the Doctor. Her thoughts seemed to be somewhere far, far away from this world, the Doctor noticed as he glanced at the android’s distant eyes. They couldn’t stand in silence forever.

“I should probably take a look at your‒,” he began, only to be interrupted by Rose herself.  
“Why’d you do it?” The question confused the Doctor. Almost two hours of complete silence on her part and that's what she decided to say? Dropping his earlier thought, he asked: “Do what?”

“Why didn’t you tell me.” Her voice wasn’t angry, per se, it was… Not anything, really. Her voice was just… flat. The question seemed sincere enough.

“I meant to,” the Doctor said, shrugging. “I wanted to. But I’m a coward. When you asked what your name was… I just didn’t… I didn’t know how to tell you. It’s so unfair, the world. I wanted to shield you from it.”

Rose was quiet for a minute, not facing the Doctor but clearly digesting his words.  
“...Wow. That’s just a shit reason,” she said then, voice a weird mix between amusement and disbelief, a hint of bitterness, too. Then again, her voice was also calmer than he would’ve expected. The Doctor couldn’t help but laugh a bit, becoming self aware.

“Yeah. It really is, now that I think of it.”

Rose turned to face the Doctor after that, still avoiding direct eye contact. At least she was talking now.

“You should probably look at my hand so we can get this over with,” Rose suggested. His stomach sunk: a small part of him had hoped that maybe she would’ve wanted to stay. Why, after all this, was a mystery. But the Doctor had still let himself hope. How foolish.

“I… yeah. Let’s take a look. Go sit there and I’ll just… I’ll be there in a minute.” He switched straight into his mechanician mode, looking around for his tool kit.

After finding his kit and all the necessary parts, the Doctor returned to Rose, who was already sitting on the bench he had assigned her to. She just sat there, legs under her, staring at her damaged right hand blankly. Blonde strands of hair fell across her face and the Doctor wished he could just reach out and tuck them behind the android’s ear.

“Okay then,” he said as he sat down beside her, banning the pining thoughts and putting a smile on. “Let’s take a look, shall we?”

It was all a facade, his supposedly good mood.

“Give me your hand?” the Doctor asked when Rose just looked at him, holding back. He glanced up, accidentally locking their eyes for a second. Both looked away quickly. Rose swallowed, but gradually reached over to the Doctor with her broken hand. He began tinkering, distracting her from the process by babbling something technical Rose would always just dub as “nerd stuff”. He got into it after a while, completely concentrating on the hand and fixing the damaged wire and nerve endings with all kinds of tiny tools.

“...It’s important that I do this part because the wires on your hand connect to various circuits inside your head and body and if the ends are even a tiny bit damaged, they might cause a short circuit when you try to do something really small like pick up a banana or…”

“...Doctor.”

“...or brush your hair or something like that, so it’s really important that I get them all sorted out and in order. Imagine trying to wave at someone and then‒”

“ _Doctor._ ”

His head snapped up as he realised Rose was saying his name. Rose wasn’t looking at the Doctor, but her hand.

“Yes, Rose?” he asked, a bit too eager for his own good. Rose just stared at her own hand with determination.

“Am I even real?” she asked. The question threw the Doctor off guard. What a strange question to ask, of course she was real! Why wouldn’t she be?

“‘S just… I was made by someone. All I am is programming and data and electric circuits. My thoughts, my emotions, my life… it’s all a lie, isn’t it? It’s not real. _I’m_ not real.” Oh, he had said the last bit aloud, then. Well.

The Doctor paused everything he was doing to try and catch Rose’s gaze. She wouldn’t look at him.

“ _Rose_ ,” he began, gently reaching for the android’s healthy hand, only for her to snatch it away from his reach. It stung, but he wasn’t going to stop trying to make a point. “We were all made by someone. Everyone is a blank slate when they are born. You aren’t any less real or capable of feeling just because you have coding instead of DNA. Humans may have built you, but the depth of your kind today is unreachable to us. I... “ The Doctor paused for a bit. He tried to think of a way to sum it up. “I guess, what I’m trying to say is… _you create yourself,_ Rose.”

“I do?” Rose questioned, looking up, finally facing the Doctor. Oh, her eyes were so, so beautiful. They held such depths, so many secrets and so much sorrow. He had missed her gaze more than he had ever realised.

“You do,” he nodded. “You are so unique. Someone made all of us, but what happens afterwards is all in our hands. No human was born hating your kind; Really I just think we are scared of what you could achieve if we let you free.”

“You’re scared too. That’s why you didn’t tell me,” Rose concluded, looking away. The Doctor was quick to correct her.  
“I’m not scared, no. I don’t really like my race. I don’t think I’m better than you, or that any human is, for that matter. I just didn’t think about the consequences when I lied to you,” he admitted. Rose looked back at him and nodded before looking back at her broken hand. Her expression was unreadable but she didn’t seem as troubled anymore.

“May I..?” the Doctor asked, gesturing at her stub of a hand.

“Oh, yeah,” Rose mumbled and gave him her hand again, letting him continue fixing the damaged wires. A more or less comfortable silence fell between them. At least it was less strained than it had been before.

The Doctor had done a good job fixing the damaged ends. Now what he had to do was to attach the wires to the matching wires of her new hand. The new hand was very robotic looking because it lacked artificial skin. The cosmetics weren’t important at this stage, though. He’d been lucky enough to have found a right sized spare hand in his workshop. It was a hand from a newer model, fortunately not too new to not be compatible with Rose’s system.

“Now, Rose, I’m going to attach the wires so you may feel a sm‒”

**_*Bzzzzrt!*_ **

The Doctor and Rose both flinched at the surge of electricity that passed through them as the two wires made contact. The Doctor quickly looked up at Rose to ask if she was okay, only to face a pair of glowing, golden eyes. Before he could react, the light crackled and Rose’s eyes closed. When she opened them again, the Doctor met her whiskey brown eyes as if nothing had happened.

“What…?” he began.

“W-woah, I think I blacked out a bit,” Rose stammered, shaken.

“That was strange,” the Doctor frowned. Seeing Rose’s equally concerned face, he was quick to think up a reasonable explanation: “I think it was just a short circuit. I’ve heard that might happen if the wires’ ends are a bit coarse. Just like in your case.”  
Rose nodded, looking a bit disoriented.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yeah, yeah… Just a bit dizzy. You?”

“I’m fine,” the Doctor nodded, secretly pleased that Rose had checked on him. Maybe she did it just because the electric shock had been partly because of her, though. That must be it.

“I should have warned you a bit earlier. I said that you might experience a slight shock through your body, but I didn’t anticipate it would be that strong.”

“It’s alright,” Rose said brushing it off and offering her hand to the Doctor once more. “Just… let’s get this fixed now.”

“I… yeah.”

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor attached the new hand on Rose’s arm in a matter of hours. He was rather brilliant, after all. Still, the Doctor couldn’t help but feel down. He had fixed her hand, so now their time should come to an end. Rose had made it quite clear that she didn’t want anything to do with him anymore.

“It might feel a bit weird at first, like it doesn’t belong to your body or it could be that it won’t follow your every command at first. It should be fully working, but test it a bit to see if it actually works as intended,” the Doctor instructed, letting go of the now fully attached hand. Rose looked down at her hand, standing up. She twisted her wrist around and wiggled her fingers experimentally.

“Feels a bit numb,” Rose observed, doing different kinds of stretch moves with her palm. The Doctor stood up as well, nodding.

“Yeah, it will probably feel like that for a while. It seems to be working perfectly, though,” the Doctor smiled sadly. Rose glanced over at the Doctor, probably hearing a hint of sadness in his words.

“You okay?” Rose asked.

“Oh, yeah, um…” he sighed. “I just… you must be going, then,” he said.

“What?”

The Doctor looked up, gesturing at her hand: “Yeah, since… since you have your hand now and…” Rose frowned.

“Why… d’you want me to go?”

“What? No! I’d… I’d love you to stay! I just thought, since you said earlier…”

Rose looked at her feet sheepishly.

“I… I’m sorry for that. I don’t really want to go. If… if that is okay, of course.” The Doctor’s heartbeat sped up at the android’s words. She… didn’t want to leave?

“YES!” the Doctor squeaked, “but… aren’t you mad at me?” Rose bit her lip.

“Yeah, I am. It was a real shitty thing to do. But… I don’t know if I want to live a life that doesn’t have you in it,” Rose drawed out, still staring at her toes.

Doctor’s heart might’ve been broken before, but now it was overflowing with love for this android. The Doctor reached out, offering his hand. To his surprise Rose met him halfway, tentatively touching their fingers together.

The Doctor couldn’t stop himself from smiling like the happy loony he was.

“Neither do I.”


	5. Fourth chapter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things start healing... or do they?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally uploading a new chapter! Sorry for the wait! <3 As usual, beta'd by @wordsintimeandspace and @starlightkissedsmiles (from tumblr)

After that night things between the Doctor and Rose started healing. Rose began discovering herself all over again with the help of the Doctor, following his tinkering with a newfound interest. He could see that she didn’t fully trust him yet. He could see it from the way she would hesitate before asking him a question or from the way she didn’t rely on him as much. It hurt, of course, but the Doctor also understood it. Her asking questions was a way to rebuild the lost trust back. And he was glad Rose was beginning to construct an independent self image.

“So, how much of it was true?” Rose asked one day as the Doctor was working on a broken computer.

“From what?” he asked, not quite sure what Rose was referring to.

“Y’know, from the story of how you found me. I was unconscious… well, shut down, more like. Was I really just lying on the street?”

The Doctor’s expression darkened as he remembered the way he had first found her. Bruised and ripped apart brutally with no remorse. “...It’s not a pretty story,” he said. “I don’t think you’d like hearing that.”  
“I don’t care. I asked you a question,” Rose responded stubbornly. The Doctor sighed.   
“Well, alright. I didn’t find you on the streets. I found you in a… in a _scrapyard_.”

Rose’s eyes widened in horror. Androids didn’t like scrapyards. They held a dark history of android brutality. Junkyards were meant for garbage and machinery, not androids. It was highly offensive to abandon broken AI there. Unfortunately, it happened regularly.

Rose might not be aware of every social and cultural taboo there was, but she had been watching the TV awfully lot for the past few days. Even if she hadn’t, the Doctor was almost sure that some sort of android instinct in Rose knew the implication of what being abandoned in a scrapyard meant.

“I… “ Rose began, voice wavering. She brought her hand to her lips. “I was abandoned in a s… _scrapyard_ ?” She said it like a dirty word. The Doctor could only look down and nod.   
“Yeah. And it’s not all. I don’t have to tell you if you don’t want to hear it, though.”

At the Doctor’s words Rose visibly steeled herself, shaking her head. “No. I can take it. Tell me.” It’s not like it could’ve been any worse than that, right?

Well, the Doctor knew it was.

“I didn’t find you whole, Rose. You had been chopped to pieces, uh… limbs off.” The Doctor glanced over at Rose who was gripping the edge of the workbench, looking a bit nauseous.

“You are whole now, though,” he said, reaching out for Rose’s hand. Her knuckles were marble white against the table. She did, however, look back at the Doctor and take his hand. There was a nod.

“You fixed me. I’m okay now,” she agreed, falling silent again. “...’s just. Why would someone do that?” she asked, a deep frown crumbling her face.

“I can only hope it wasn’t a person who did it,” the Doctor answered. “It’s possible it was a wild animal.” Thinking about it still made the Doctor’s skin crawl, but at least it was easier to accept than some person actually being heartless enough to do something like that to another living being.

It was when the Doctor felt a firm squeeze in his hand that he realised they were still holding hands. He looked up, smiling at the android beside him. Even in her distraught state she managed to smile back at him with reassurance and love.

He never wanted to let go of her hand ever again.

 

\--------------------------

 

Sunlight shed light on the workshop through the colourful leaves of the old elm tree standing in front of his window. The shadows of the leaves draped across the Doctor and Rose’s faces, gently filtering the light. It was a calm afternoon, just the way the Doctor liked it. It was even better with Rose at his side.

“Are there androids who don’t have owners?”

“Of course. There are plenty.”

“D’ya suppose I had an owner, though?” Rose asked. She was in a mood for questions today, it seemed. The Doctor took a moment to ponder her question before answering.

“It’s likely, yeah. Your model was produced for…” he felt iffy even saying it, “ _service_ _purposes_.”

“ _Was_ produced?” Rose asked in surprise.

“Yep. Your model unit isn’t produced anymore. Most of the RO-53 units have been replaced with RO-54 units,” he explained.

“What’s so good about them that I can’t do?” Rose frowned, suddenly very defensive. The Doctor sighed.

“Nothing. And I mean it. RO-54 units are different because humans aim to build them without emotions. Purely for service and work. Your model was too… rebellious, so to speak. So it had to be replaced with a model better suited for its intended purpose.”

“...Wow,” Rose let out. “That’s just messed up.”

“I know,” the Doctor sighed. ”It’s just downright cruel. Humans want to control everything, but what we don’t seem to realise is that you cannot control life. We can try to rule an individual’s independent mind but that has never ended well.”

“I feel bad for them,” Rose said. Of course she would. She didn’t want anyone to suffer. “They must be so scared. People are messing up with their circuits and trying to turn them into machines. We’re not machines.”

“No, you’re not,” the Doctor agreed. Androids were higher than highest high tech. That’s what he’d always thought. Treating them merely as machinery was positively insulting.

He continued fixing the computer’s motherboard after their conversation dried out. Rose sat beside the Doctor quietly, following every movement of his clever fingers. It was comforting, having someone just sitting there and keeping him silent company. He knew that many people didn’t like it when someone was watching you work and it made them uncomfortable, but luckily the Doctor wasn’t one of those people. Maybe he’d been alone for too long to ever mind having somebody close, who knew.

“Give me the small screwdriver?” the Doctor asked, blindly reaching his arm out towards Rose who was sitting next to the toolbox.

“The one with the blue handle?” Rose asked, moving the tools around with one hand.

“No, the thin yellow one that has a cross shaped end.”

After hearing the tools clattering around, the Doctor felt Rose’s hand brush against his reached out one, giving the small utensil to him.

“Thanks,” he mumbled as he continued working with the tiny teensy bits of the damaged motherboard.  
“Whose computer are you fixing?” Rose inquired.

“It belongs to Mrs. Tyler,” the Doctor answered, absorbed into his work. “A nice lady. Widowed, no children. She’s a bit scary, though. Lives across the street. I repair her stuff from time to time.”  
“For free?” He could practically see the frown on her face, solely based on her tone.

“Uh… Maybe? As I said, she’s a bit scary,” the Doctor chuckled. “Slapped me once. But she has a heart of gold. She sometimes comes by to give me home-cooked food because I forget to eat.”  
“Aww, that’s nice of her,” Rose approved. For a while, nobody spoke.

“Come to think of it, there’s this funny thing I just remembered.”

“What’s that?” Rose asked.

“Weeelll… She has this dog. A tiny, tiny thing. Always barking and challenging dogs three times her size.”

“Okay…? Did the dog slap you too or what?” Rose quipped, grinning. The Doctor paused his work, looking at the chuckling android, feigning offence: “Oi!”

“Obviously not. Is just… I just remembered the dog’s name,” the Doctor admitted, embarrassed. Rose was still confused.

“So?” she questioned.

“Well… The dog’s name might or might not be Rose.” Rose’s face sobered instantly.

“What? You named me after a dog?!”

Furious. She was absolutely furious. The Doctor was quick to defend himself: “No Rose, I swear! I didn’t even remember it until now! I promise! I just… since your model is RO-53 I thought it’d be clever to… you know, the number five is kinda like the letter ‘s’ and the three is like a backwards ‘e’, right? So I‒”

“...Okay, okay Doctor, I believe you! You don’t need to explain it. Just… what the heck? That’s not funny!” Rose laughed, clearly unamused. “Not funny,” she repeated as she tried to tamp down her own laughter.

The Doctor relaxed at the sight of her, giggling and trying to be cross with him (and failing) at the same time. It was impossible not to smile at that.

Rose noticed him smiling and pointed an accusing finger at him in a half-hearted attempt to be intimidating.

“Stop smiling! I’m still very cross with you!” she tried.

The Doctor didn’t stop smiling.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor wasn’t a big fan of clothes shopping. He had said it before and he would remind everyone of that again if necessary. However, he noticed as he had once again tagged along with Rose to buy her new clothing, he did have a small soft spot for a certain android. Well. Small was a relative word. In reality, he was absolutely smitten, even to the point where he voluntarily accompanied Rose in clothing stores. Just seeing the android’s face light up at the concept of possessions of her own made it all worth it in the Doctor’s opinion.

Now the two were back at his workshop and Rose was walking around with her brand new pink sweater on.

Had he just said that just seeing her happy face was enough of a reward? Well, while that was correct, it was nothing compared to the hugs she gave him. Her new sweater was soft and warm, but the person wearing it was even softer. The Doctor did nothing more gladly than swoop the android up in a big hug and hear her laugh as he swirled them around.

When had he become so attached to her?

As the sun was starting to set the Doctor found himself staring at Rose instead of his work. The android was gazing out of the big window, light hitting her face in an aesthetic way that you’d see in the movies. Her brown eyes were like pools of gold against the sunlight, almost glowing.

Rose noticed the Doctor staring at her, mildly startled but quickly recovering with a gentle smile.

“What?” she asked, reaching her hand out to clasp their fingers together.

“Nothing,” he answered in kind, snapping out of his trance. “Just lost in thought.” Rose grinned.  
“It happens when you have such a big brain,” she teased. The Doctor smiled, biting his lip.

“Yeah, it does.”

Rose smiled wide, pressing her chin against her other shoulder. The android’s hair slumped across her face at the movement. Rose tried to nudge the mass of hair away with the help of her face and shoulder, turning to gaze at the Doctor with a wistful expression on her face.

“What?” he asked in turn, blushing from the attention he was given. Rose shrugged, squeezing his hand.

“I saw the mail at the door the other day. It was designated to someone called ‘John Smith’. So I was thinking, _‘who’s that?’_ I’ve never heard you mention any John, but it’s clearly not coming to the wrong place since you open it and...” Rose’s voice faded out at the Doctor’s awkward silence and her eyes widened in realisation. “Oh. Oh! Shit, I’ve been so stupid,” she laughed. “ _You_ are John Smith,” Rose realised, an embarrassed look passing across her face.

“...Yeah, that’s… that’s me,” the Doctor said, ruffling his hair with his free hand nervously. “Never really adapted to that one,” he admitted. Rose was having a full moment of her mind being blown, though.

“I never even questioned it, for some reason. I always just thought you were called the Doctor, but… wow.” The Doctor smiled.

“It’s a rather boring name, isn’t it?” he asked, waiting for Rose to say what every other person who knew his whole name usually said first.

“No! Well… yes, but… okay, it is rather boring,” Rose admitted, “fits you perfectly, though,” she added with a tongue touched grin.

“ _Oi!_ ”

“Just kidding, Doctor! You’re not boring,” Rose giggled and squeezed their hands together briefly before letting go and getting up.

“Boring, yeah right,” the Doctor mumbled before continuing his work.

 

\--------------------------

 

The rest of the evening went by in a blur. The Doctor was working on Mrs. Tyler’s computer and Rose was listening to a very old fashioned and retro radio the Doctor had in his workshop. She had a lot of fun checking out the different radio stations.

“Do people even have radios anymore?” she had asked, amused. Technology had left radios behind centuries ago. The Doctor, however, had all sorts of weird gadgets in his workshop. Besides, he liked how simple the old things were. No hundreds of different buttons for a single function. Just a volume button and the one that you could use to change stations. Besides, he liked to remind Rose, those radios were amazing because you could hear all sorts of classical music from them. Since radios weren’t a thing anymore, most radio stations were gone. Some of them were still up and running. Mostly playing classics like Britney Spears’ ballad, Toxic, or the speech podcasts of the ever famous storyteller, Snoop Dogg. The Doctor never quite understood the messages of his stories. So fast-paced and… well, explicit. Rose told him it was “called art”.

The doorbell rang as the Doctor was just finishing up with the computer. Rose was in the kitchen doing her own thing.

“Someone’s at the door,” Rose announced after the bell’s ringing.

“Yeah, it’s Mrs. Tyler. She’s here to get her computer back, just in time!” the Doctor quipped, speeding up with the last touches.

“Should I go open or will you go?” Rose questioned.  
“Yeah, go open the door for her. I’ll be there in a minute, I’m just going to finish the computer up,” he requested, trying to be as quick as possible. He heard Rose’s steps as she walked out of the room, doing what was asked of her. He heard the door open but no further sounds of any kind.

“...Doctor?” That was Rose’s voice.

Finishing up, the Doctor got up from his seat, wiped his dirty hands on his shirt and hurried to the door.

As soon as he reached the door and Rose he froze beside her, looking at the visitor who most certainly was not Mrs. Tyler.

“Hello, Doctor Smith. I’m here to reclaim my RO-53 unit.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...I'm not too sorry for the cliffie;P


	6. Fifth chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things are heating up...  
> A huge thanks to @dimensionhoppingrose and @starlightkissedsmiles, and to @wordsintimeandspace for being my trusty beta <3

 

_ “Hello, Doctor Smith. I’m here to reclaim my RO-53 unit.” _

It was like a rug was pulled out from under the Doctor’s feet. This couldn’t be happening. Right?

The Doctor was dimly aware of someone taking his hand and squeezing tight. Rose. As he opened his mouth to answer, his voice sounded oddly thin: “Ex...excuse me?”

“My RO-53. It appears you have found her. I thank you for taking care of her, but I’m here to take her back,” the man at the door said. He was shorter than the Doctor. Blonde and wearing a black hoodie. He had a scruffy looking stubble and a pair of sharp eyes. Even as he smiled the Doctor shivered unpleasantly. Something about this man was off.

“You can’t do that,” Rose argued. Her voice was shaky. She was clearly trying to be tough, but the Doctor could tell she wasn’t from the way her nails bit into his palm.

“Actually,” the man said, reaching into his pocket, “legally, I can.” He opened a neatly folded bundle of papers, showing them to the Doctor.

“Harold Saxon. I legally own the rights to this specific RO-53 service unit. Here are the official documents declaring my ownership over her,” the man,  _ Harold Saxon _ , presented.

The Doctor felt his throat close up. Face stone cold, he stepped in front of Rose protectively.

“She isn’t going anywhere. She’s no one’s possession,” he declared, very much trying not to growl.

Mr. Saxon smiled. It made the Doctor uncomfortable.

“She is my property, Doctor Smith. Here are the records. Now, if you’d kindly hand her over, so‒”

“No! I belong to no one. Whoever you claim to be, ‘m not going with you. You clearly abandoned me anyway, so you have no right to come crawling back now!” Rose stepped up from behind the Doctor, fierce and ready to fight him.

Saxon didn’t seem intimidated at all, he just kept smiling in that unsettling way. What angered the Doctor the most about him was how calm he was. He was so… smug, even. It was like he knew he was going to get his way.

“I found her abandoned in a scrapyard, torn to pieces. How am I supposed to believe that you weren’t the one behind that?” the Doctor questioned.

Saxon’s smile faltered at that. He recovered quickly, though. He shrugged, casually suggesting: “...Wild animals, perhaps?” This time the Doctor could not keep from growling. Before he could say anything more, he felt Rose push him aside.

“Why’d you even bother with me? There are newer models out there. Get one of those if you must!”

“I’m not one to let my possession wander around, RO-53. What’s mine is mine,” Saxon said with a sickly sweet voice.

“It’s _ Rose _ ,” Rose snarled. The man’s eyebrows shot up.

“Rose? Look at you, you have a name now, too? Well then,  _ Rose _ ,” Saxon drew out her name, “you ought to come back home with me. Doctor Smith here has been very generous to take care of you, but now it’s time to go. Protesting will only get him in trouble for stealing my legal property.”

Rose’s resistance died out after that. She looked at the Doctor, defeated. The Doctor, however, wasn’t ready to let this be it. He turned to face Saxon with an oncoming storm in his eyes.

“I said it, and I’m gonna say it again. She isn’t going anywhere.”

“You might want to think again, Doctor Smith. I have the law on my side,” Saxon answered, his demeanor changing into a more serious, dark one.

“I don’t care,” the Doctor spit in response, thinking about nothing but keeping Rose away from that greedy gold digger. “There’s nothing here for you. Get out.”

Saxon’s face darkened, all traces of that playful smile gone. Had the Doctor been calmer, he would have realised that this man was truly dangerous.

“Fine. Let’s do it your way, then.”

And with that, Saxon was gone, leaving the two standing at the door, shaken.

 

\--------------------------

 

A heavy silence hung in the air. Harold Saxon’s sudden appearance had changed everything. Suddenly, the Doctor and Rose’s easy-going life at the workshop was gone. Neither of the two had spoken after Saxon had stormed out. The tight clasp of their hands had slowly parted, leaving them both feeling alone and unnerved. The knot in the Doctor’s stomach kept getting tighter, making him unable to think straight.

The Doctor was sitting back at his workbench, staring at Mrs. Tyler’s computer blankly. He heard Rose walk behind him.

“...Doctor?” she asked meekly. He didn’t have it in him to answer. He was afraid of what he might say if he did. “What… what are we going to do?” Rose asked. When he still didn’t answer, Rose repeated his name, voice a bit steadier: “Doctor?”

He stared down at the computer even harder, as if trying to drill a hole into the screen. He could see a fuzzy reflection of Rose, standing behind him. She was clearly distraught, asking for help. Oh, the Doctor wanted to help. He just didn’t have any clue what to do. A genius, him, and he had nothing to offer now that wits were needed.

The silence stretched for a while. The Doctor didn’t really know what he expected to happen, but of course not answering frustrated her.

“Fuck, Doctor, say something!” Nothing.

“...Fine. ‘M just gonna go then.” At her curt words, a pure wave of panic hit the Doctor. It snapped him out of his trance, making him scramble up and turn to Rose who was already heading for the door.

“NO! Rose, wait,” he begged, rushing after her. Rose turned around, furious.   
“You can’t just stop talking to me like that! I already feel like crap, and then you just stop responding to me out of the blue?”   
The Doctor reached for Rose’s hands and was relieved when, despite her anger, she didn’t pull away.

“I’m so sorry, Rose. Just… I have no idea what we can do,” he revealed, miserable. Rose deflated, looking at their joined hands.

“He’s gonna go to the police, Doctor. There’s not much we can do ‘bout that. You’re gonna get in trouble for holding his... possession,” Rose said, not meeting the Doctor’s eyes. “Still doesn’t mean you get to just stop responding like I’m not here anymore. I might need like… actual support or something. I have no one but you.” He sighed, feeling guilty.

“You’re right, Rose. I’m sorry. It’s just that I couldn’t care less about getting in trouble. All I care about is you being free and I’m trying but failing and…” The Doctor was interrupted by Rose’s arms wrapping around him and hugging him tight.

“I know, I know… We’ll work this out, though. Right?” The Doctor returned the embrace, holding the soft android impossibly close.

“I hope so.”

 

\--------------------------

 

Rose and the Doctor were sitting on the floor, Rose hooked up on the Doctor’s computer.

“He was the same man, wasn’t he?” the Doctor asked as he went through different folders on his desktop.

“Yeah, he’s the one who was at the door that day. At least now we know he did know me,” Rose responded bitterly. “What I don’t understand is why he didn’t just take me back right then, though. If he is my o…” Rose paused to take a breath, “...owner. If he is.”

“Maybe he didn’t have the papers with him or then he didn’t dare to because I was close by? I don’t have a clue, really,” he said. “But I do think he was your legal owner. Those papers weren’t fake. Besides, it doesn’t explain why he is so interested in having you back.”

“Yeah I wish I could remember. I… I never really questioned it, actually. Is there a chance you could look into my chip to see if my memory is locked there somewhere or something?” Rose asked.   
“Uh… I wish I could. When I was fixing you I noticed that your memory data was wiped, not locked. It’s simply gone, Rose. Forever. I’m sorry,” the Doctor apologised. He had never really told her that. Who knew, maybe Rose had thought it was amnesia all along. The Doctor felt bad for not clearing the fact up earlier.

“Oh,” Rose answered, blank. “What are you doing right now, then?” she asked.   
“Looking for a reason why you’d be so special for Saxon that he wants you back,” he responded. When Rose didn’t say anything, the Doctor realised how rude he’d sounded. “Wait– no, I didn’t mean… You are so special, Rose, I…”

“No it’s okay, I get what you meant,” Rose cut him off.

“Oh, good. Good. Because I do think you are special, Rose. You are kind, beautiful, and talented of course, and…”

“Doctor, I said it’s okay! Okay?” Rose laughed, reaching for his hand.

“Okay, okay,” he nodded. A comfortable silence fell between them, during which only the steady sound of the Doctor’s fingers hitting the keyboard could be heard.

“...there seem to be small anomalies in your base code,” the Doctor said aloud, ending the silence. Rose frowned.

“What are they?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I remember finding them the first time I hooked you up on this machine. The anomalies… they’re unlike anything I’ve seen. No human could’ve encoded them.”

“Okay… but are they dangerous?” Rose sounded worried.

“No, I don’t think so. They haven’t done anything to disturb the way you function, right? So they can’t be anything major.”

“Well are you finding anything else, then?” The Doctor sighed, pushing up his reading glasses on the bridge of his nose.   
“No, not really. There are no hidden files on your chip. I don’t understand why he’d be willing to take legal action over something like this.” That had been heavily implied in his threats, after all. The Doctor and Rose were clearly the underdogs in this case.   
“Maybe he’s just mad,” Rose suggested.

“Maybe, yeah,” he agreed, massaging his temples. It was frustrating. This Saxon person had just appeared out of nowhere, claiming his ownership over Rose. It made no sense unless he was just a plain nutcase. If he really just wanted his servant android back, he could get a RO-54 and it would be cheaper than going through the legal system.

Gently plugging the wires off of Rose’s neck and skull, the Doctor closed his laptop’s lid and got up.

“In any case,” he said while putting the wires away, “we should expect the police to show up by the evening.” Rose followed the Doctor’s movement from the floor, chewing on her lip. As she spoke, her voice was unnaturally thin: “And?”

The Doctor sighed, pulling his hair. He didn’t really want to think about that.

“And… and there’s nothing we can do about that.” Rose didn’t seem satisfied with his resolution.

“That’s it? We’re just waiting for the inevitable?” She frowned. The Doctor shrugged.

“What else is there? It’s not like we can just disappear unnoticed. Everything’s monitored in New London. They have surveillance cameras in places you don’t even know exist,” he said. Rose fell silent.

“They do?” she asked.

“Yup. I mean, it’s not quite the Big Brother house, but most things in public areas are being recorded.”

“...even the scrapyards?” Rose asked slowly, curious.

“Yeah I suppose, but why? It’s not like… Oh. You weren’t talking about that anymore, you were talking about…  _ oh _ ,” the Doctor said as it dawned on him. Rose’s question made sense all of a sudden. A big, hopeful grin took over his face. “Rose, you’re bloody brilliant, you know that?” Rose seemed confused.

“I am?”

“Yes! If what I’m suspecting is correct, then Saxon can’t go to the authorities without getting in trouble himself!” he laughed.   
“Wait, really?” she questioned. The Doctor nodded vigorously, pacing around like an ecstatic puppy.

“See, I think it was him who disposed of you,” he began explaining. “Did you see his face when I asked about how I found you? He’s got to at least be involved in it somehow, he clearly wasn’t surprised by the information. Which means that he’s done something illegal, which means he can’t go to the police without the truth getting out, which means he was probably just trying to intimidate us into giving up!” the Doctor declared excitedly, turning around to face Rose, who looked like she had tried very hard not to fall behind.

“Okay but that’s still just a possibility. Besides, ‘m an android. Think the legal system wouldn’t be in my favour much,” she said. The Doctor pursed his lips and spun around, pacing back and forth.

“I mean, it’s possible I’m just grasping at straws here. But…” he drew out, “it would explain why he would visit us first instead going straight to the police. He already knew where you were.”

“Great, but I’m still just an android,” Rose reminded him. God, she was hard to convince. The Doctor couldn’t blame her for that; he had no water proof evidence after all.

“You’re not ‘just’ anything, Rose. You are you and you are wonderful,” he argued, not pleased with the tone of her voice. “Yes, the police would probably let him off the hook because of the circumstances, but he did, albeit assumably, commit a crime. Taking legal action would still get him in trouble,” he continued, looking directly at Rose. Her expression was pensive at the best. Slowly, the Doctor’s enthusiasm started catching on her, though.

“So if you’re correct, that means his hands are bound, yeah? So… if we had evidence we could go to the police first and… wait, no. We can’t do that,” Rose halted, turning to the Doctor who was already nodding in silent agreement. “You’d still get in trouble.”   
“And you would end up in his possession,” the Doctor added. Rose’s eyes bore into the Doctor’s, holding his gaze in understanding.

“No police, then. No matter what, they can’t get involved.” He nodded again, grim.

“You best be right about this, Doctor,” she said out loud what he was thinking.

The only thing they could do was wait and see.

 

\--------------------------

 

The day went on painfully slowly. Both the Doctor and Rose were on the edge, carefully hopeful but still prepared for the worst. The only visitor they got that day was Mrs. Tyler who came to pick up her computer. Still, hearing the doorbell ring made the Doctor jump visibly. Rose was just as startled, nervously glancing at the door.

“I’ll get it,” the Doctor assured, leaving an anxious Rose sitting in his workshop.

“Hello, John. Got my computer?” Mrs. Tyler greeted at the door. The Doctor let out the breath he’d been holding for God knows how long.

“Yup! I’m just gonna get it for you, and…”

“Who’s that?” Mrs. Tyler interrupted him all of a sudden, looking past him.

“What, who?” the Doctor asked, looking around. Turning around, he saw Rose peeking from around the corner carefully. “Oh! That’s… Rose, meet Mrs. Tyler! Jackie, this is Rose, my… assistant,” he introduced, rubbing the back of his neck. He could hear Rose shifting closer.

“Hi,” the android greeted nervously. Mrs. Tyler’s face softened immediately.

“‘ello, young lady. I’m Jacqueline. You call me Jackie, though.” The Doctor glanced at Rose, whose face was full with pure curiosity and wonder. Jackie was a blonde, short woman in her mid-forties, hair up in a ponytail and a pastel track suit on. Her accent reminded the Doctor a lot of Rose’s accent, which was curious.

“‘m Rose,” Rose said. The Doctor couldn’t quite fathom why she was acting so nervous all of a sudden. Maybe it was just her nerves after waiting for the police to show up for the whole day. Jackie smiled.

“I have a dog named Rose, you know,” she said.   
“The Doctor told me, yeah,” Rose nodded.

“Oh, look at you,” Jackie said, “way too good for that loony. Is he taking good care of you, hm? Were you my daughter, I’d slap him all over to make sure he’s treating you right,” she announced. Rose giggled at that.

“Oi! Rude!” the Doctor pouted. Jackie ignored him.

 

\--------------------------

 

Rose and Mrs. Tyler had bonded immediately. It was heartwarming to see Rose forget her worries for a while and openly chat with the older woman. Jackie couldn’t stay for the whole evening, though, and soon the Doctor and Rose were back at anxiously waiting for things to unfold.

The Doctor hated waiting. It was his least favourite part of anything. That’s why he’d always hated Christmas as a little boy. Why did you have to wait until the next morning to open the gifts? That was insane. The waiting he and Rose had to do now was very different, but just as infuriating. Waiting for something that might never come.

“Doctor?” It was Rose’s voice. He turned around to face a worried looking Rose. The android reached for his hand.

“It’s been hours. You should go to sleep, Doctor,” she said. It was then that the Doctor actually noticed how late it was. He was tired, too, barely standing straight. The last days had worn him down.

“No, I’m fine. Don’t need much sleep, me,” he beamed, trying to appear as brisk as ever. Rose wasn’t having any of it, though.   
“I know for a fact you’ve not been sleeping. You might be an insomniac but that doesn’t mean you don’t need sleep,” she pointed out. The Doctor sighed.

“Rose, now it’s not the time for me to sleep. I’m fine!”

“No you’re not. You’ve been standing there for ten minutes staring at the window as if someone’s coming through it. For the longest time I was sure you’d fallen asleep with your eyes open,” Rose argued. “I think you were right about Saxon. The Police still hasn’t showed up and it’s past ten in the evening, so I don’t see why you can’t go lie down. You are clearly exhausted.”

Rose was right. He was exhausted. But he couldn’t just… he kept feeling like something was off. He was sure Rose felt it too.

“Please. Just try to sleep for a while so you’ll get your energy back. You’re no use in this state,” Rose said.

In the end, the Doctor gave in. He agreed to sleep as long as Rose stayed in the same room as him and promised to wake him up if she as much as heard a noise. Rose thought he was being silly, but if that was what got him to take care of himself, she was ready to accept his demands.

The Doctor had trouble falling asleep at first. He was anxious and jumpy, not finding a good position in his bed. Rose was sitting in the bedroom, reading in the dim light of a desk lamp. Only when Rose got sick of listening him turning around repeatedly and came to lie beside him, taking his hand, the Doctor could close his eyes and feel at peace.

“C’mon, Doctor. You can sleep now. I’ll wake you up if something happens, just like we agreed.”

With Rose’s comforting hand in his and her steady breathing filling the silence, the Doctor was asleep in no time.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor awoke to a loud bang. His eyes flew open, sleep trying to sew them back together. He couldn’t see a thing, it was pitch dark. He squeezed Rose’s hand to alert her… only to realise her hand was gone. A cold wave of panic struck him and he sprung up, desperately trying to locate a light switch.

“Shh, I’m here, it’s okay,” a quiet voice said. A soft pair of hands on his sweaty skin startled him. The Doctor immediately turned around and took Rose’s hands in his, trying to see in the dark, searching for her face. He heard her breathing, he could feel the warm puffs of air hit his face.

“Rose?” His voice sounded hoarse and sleepy. Dear God, how long had he slept? It was still dark outside.

“Yeah. Sorry, I just… I heard the noise and…” The Doctor froze as he remembered the loud bang. He gripped Rose’s arms tight, not daring to let go of her.   
“The noise came from the workshop,” Rose whispered. The Doctor could almost hear her little android heart beating rapidly.

“I’ll… I’ll check it out. You hide,” he said with a lowered voice, tiptoeing over to the door.

“Like hell I will,” Rose answered, moving a step behind the Doctor, taking his hand. “The door is to the left,” Rose added, tugging him in the right direction. How could she know? It was too dark to… Oh, right, of course. _ She must have a night vision. _

“Should I go first?” Rose asked.

“No, absolutely not,” the Doctor answered, voice grim. He leaned on the door, turning the handle slowly. He could hear subtle noises from the other side of the door.

As the door creaked open, the Doctor’s eyes were hit with a dim light. In his drowsy state it felt like a blinding sun thrown at his face. Someone had turned the workshop’s lights on. Or had he left them on?

The two sneaked over to the corridor. The noises were still subtle, but he could clearly make out the sound of shoes stepping on the wooden floor of the workshop.

“I know you’re there,” a man’s voice startled them both. “And you are holding something that belongs to me,” it continued. Saxon. The bastard had broken in.

Coming out of the corridor with Rose close behind him, the Doctor growled: “There’s nothing here for you, Saxon. Get out.” He felt Rose shift behind him, whispering to his ear:

“Watch out, he’s got a‒”

“Stay out of it, Rose,” the Doctor hissed, his nerves getting the best of him. He felt Rose back off a bit, obviously hurt. Oh, he’d made a mistake.

“Trouble in paradise?” Saxon sneered, eyes mad.

It all happened so fast. He had no time to react as Saxon pulled out his gun, smirking: “Here’s some more.”

_ Bang. _ There was a loud bang of a gun aimed directly at him.

In that fraction of a millisecond the Doctor prepared himself for the pain of a bullet piercing his skin.

The pain never came. Instead, he carefully opened his eyes to see the room full of golden, blinding light.

Frozen in the air, only mere inches away from the Doctor’s forehead, was the bullet.

 

* * *

 

_tbc..._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry to leave it off to a such cliffie AGAIN. Welp. Gotta keep you interested somehow, don't I?


	7. Sixth chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta by the ever so wonderful @wordsintimeandspace (I suggest you go follow her now if you haven’t) and shoutout to @starlightkissedsmiles for supporting me with this story! (Mostly by bloating my ego with flatter I literally beg for lol) Sidenote: the text in the illustration is meant to be the way it is, don’t worry ;)

 

The Doctor was a man of reason. He believed in science above all else. Not once in his life had he believed in the supernatural, or the afterlife, or any of that nonsense.

However, standing in the middle of his workshop in pyjamas and staring death right in the eye, the Doctor found himself re-evaluating his life philosophy.

As he slowly began recovering from his shock, he dared to move his head to look at Rose. A part of him was constantly afraid that the bullet would carry on with its momentum the second he looked away, but another part of him didn’t care about anything but seeing if Rose was okay.   
Rose… no,  _ something that looked like her _ , was standing next to him, hand stretched out. Her eyes were glowing like pits of molten gold, radiating so brightly it hurt to look at them. Rose’s whole body was lit up from inside out, like light trying to seep through every little nook and cranny. She was staring right past the Doctor, at Saxon, who was laughing manically in the background.

“R-Rose?” the Doctor asked, reaching out tentatively. A pair of golden eyes settled on him, empty with bright light. The eye contact made him dizzy. As she spoke, it was like hearing a thousand echoes through time.   
_ “I am the Bad Wolf. I was created to protect the innocent.” _

“...And _ who  _ is that? Who created you?” the Doctor wondered in disbelief. Who could’ve possibly invented something like this?

_ “I created myself.” _

The Doctor’s eyes widened with horror. What was happening to Rose? Was this some sort of virus?

“Oh, that is so beautiful,” Saxon praised, voice full of awe. He distracted the Doctor momentarily from Rose by stepping closer and bringing the Doctor on the edge once again.   
“Hello,  _ Wolf _ ,” Saxon greeted, “you must recognise me. I am to be your Master.” He smiled a wide, ugly smile. The Doctor’s gaze flew back to Rose, whose eyebrows were furrowed deep. As she opened her mouth, light poured out. Her hair was all over the place, fury coursing through her ethereal being. The Doctor felt a shiver ripple through his whole body.

_ “No,” _ she echoed firmly.  _ “You tried to hurt my Doctor. You don’t deserve to exist in this universe.”  _ And with that, the Wolf twisted her wrist. The bullet, floating in the air, twisted around to face Saxon whose smile froze instantly. The Doctor didn’t need clues to realise what was about to happen.

“Rose, no, wait,” he tried. She ignored him, staring down Saxon with endless power swirling in her eyes.

_ “Goodbye, mortal.” _

“Rose, stop!” the Doctor shouted, grabbing her outstretched arm. That got her attention in a flash. She faced the Doctor with those golden eyes, looking straight through him. He felt dizzy from the intensity of it. It was like staring at time itself.

_ “Why?” _ she asked, confused. The Doctor could swear he saw the lights in her eyes flicker.

“Rose, I don’t know what’s happening, but I know you would regret it forever if you killed him now. Please, don’t do it,” he begged, feeling Rose’s skin hot against his hands.

“Too late, Doctor.” Saxon had pulled out his gun again. Before he had the chance to shoot, though, he yelped in pain and dropped the weapon like it had burned him.

_ “Your cheap toy is nothing against me,” _ the Wolf said, eyes never straying away from the Doctor’s. He looked at her desperately, waiting for her to do something.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, she shifted and looked back at Saxon. He was clearly pissed off, but the Doctor could see a hint of fear behind it.

_ “I give you mercy.” _

With a flick of her wrist, Saxon collapsed on the ground. Unconscious, just like that.

“Rose? Rose, are you okay?” the Doctor asked, touching the glowing being’s cheeks and trying to figure out what was going on now that Saxon was out of the picture. She was burning up.

Rose looked drowsy, the light within her flickering repeatedly. She was out of focus, trying to reach out for the Doctor’s cheek.   
_ “Safe…”  _ she whispered, voice fading along with the bright light. Rose’s eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed into the Doctor’s arms, shut down.

 

\--------------------------

 

As the Doctor hooked Rose up on the computer, he noticed straight away what had caused the short circuit. He felt it in the hotness of her skin, too; she had overheated. Whatever the “Bad Wolf” had been, it had rapidly overheated Rose’s system.

Gently brushing the unconscious android’s cheek, the Doctor sat down. He had taken care of Saxon while he was out of it by carrying the man out of the house, leaving him on a bench on the street. Now it was just him and Rose.

Clicking through the code, the Doctor tried to find a trace of the creature. Could it be those anomalies he had detected back then? Had they always been there?

_ I created myself _ , she had said. Those words reminded him of what he had said to Rose after the lie had come out. It felt like a strange coincidence.

A sudden loud noise that emitted from the computer startled the Doctor. The screen went dark and a pop-up appeared. “Unknown virus detected in the connected unit RO-53. Access to base code denied.”

“What?” the Doctor yelped in confusion, trying to click himself into Rose’s base code again. The same pop-up emerged. Denied. It hadn’t been denied yesterday. After a while of repeated trying and failing, the Doctor unplugged Rose from his computer and moved her to a platform that would help her system cool down faster. He plugged Rose into a charger of sorts, too. Modern day androids like Rose were fully capable of recharging themselves infinitely as long as nothing was broken. However, a little help from an outside source wouldn’t hurt Rose. This short circuit had been bad, and she would likely be very disoriented when she woke up. Because she would wake up. Of course she would. There was nothing wrong with her, right?  _ Right? _

The Doctor opened up a tab on his laptop and wrote  _ “bad wolf” _ in the search bar. Pictures of old folklores popped up, of a red-hooded little girl and a gray wolf. It wasn’t what the Doctor was looking for.  _ “Bad Wolf android” _ was what he wrote next. The search results were similar, nothing that really caught his eye. There had to be some information, hadn’t there?

_ “Bad Wolf virus”  _ was his last search term. At first the results seemed identical, but then an article caught his eye:  _ “Theory time: Is the Bad Wolf paradox real?”  _ on a website called worldwideandroidcommunity.com. It was a forum post, so the Doctor didn’t know how much he should give it credit, but it was the only thing that seemed even remotely relevant.

Most of the blog post was some far-fetched nonsense about time paradoxes and saviours of the androidkind and such. It was your average forum banter, full of weird stuff and heated opinions. However, it had some useful information the Doctor had never expected to need. The Bad Wolf wasn’t only in the thousand-year-old fairytale about Little Red Riding Hood, it was also a much more recent folklore, so to speak. Androids had their own culture the Doctor knew next to nothing about so it wasn’t really a surprise he’d never heard of “the legend of the Bad Wolf”. However, the description of the legend was frightfully close to what he’d just experienced.

_ “The story tells that the Bad Wolf is capable of manipulating time and space itself. When the Bad Wolf arrives, everything is aflame with golden light. The Wolf is said to bring justice to the innocent, but it destroys entire worlds in its selfishness. They say that the Wolf is everywhere, in every single being and fleck of dust.” _

So… what did it mean, then? Was the thing inside Rose considered some sort of saviour of the androidkind? The comment section was full of androids voicing their opinions. Unsurprisingly, they were pretty divided. Many of them didn’t believe in the story, some thought it was a cool theory (the Doctor hadn’t even read what the actual theory had been about), and some actually seemed to be dead serious about it. People were attacking the original poster for portraying the Wolf as a good guy, when in the story the Wolf had been “not a saviour, but a destroyer”. It was confusing to say the least. And complete rubbish, if somebody asked him. It was just an old AI fairytale, not holding that much significance amongst them either, as it turned out. But what else could it be? He had seen Rose stop an actual bullet in the air and he’d seen her knock out Saxon with only a small flick of her wrist. That couldn’t be an ordinary computer virus. It had created itself, even. That’s what it had said.

Bad Wolf was a mystery the Doctor couldn’t solve.

 

\--------------------------

 

It was a quiet morning. The Doctor spent the early hours repairing the workshop’s door: the bang they had heard first had been Saxon breaking the door open. The hinges were fairly undamaged, but the handle was broken. It was an easy fix, though. Everything was easy compared to the stuff he was dealing with Rose.

From time to time, the Doctor checked on Rose to make sure she was still stable. He couldn’t reboot her before her core temperature had cooled down enough or before she had enough energy. His stomach plummeted every time he glanced at her direction. Seeing Rose so unnaturally still, devoid of life and movement… it upset him. He didn’t want to wait any longer to restore her power.

“It’s time to wake up, Rose,” the Doctor murmured gently, brushing the android’s hair back with his hand. He detached the wires off of Rose and watched carefully as her system began restarting.

A low-pitched noise emitted from Rose. Ever so slowly, her eyes fluttered open. A fleck of gold flickered in Rose’s eyes momentarily before settling into a warm, whiskey brown colour. Her gaze was cloudy and unfocused.

“Rose?” the Doctor asked, hovering above her. Rose blinked a few times, looking around herself. When her gaze settled on the Doctor, recognition lit up in her eyes. She smiled sleepily.

“Hello, Doctor.”

“Are you in any pain?” he asked worriedly. Rose’s expression went from happy and sleepy to concerned as she saw the Doctor’s grim face.

“No, I’m… I feel okay. Bit hot in here, tho’.” She frowned and tried to get up, but the Doctor gently pushed her back down with an apologetic look. “Why? Is there somethin’ wrong with me?” she inquired, not trying to force herself upright anymore. It was heartwarming to see she trusted him.

“What do you remember of last night?” The Doctor watched as Rose’s expression morphed into one of confusion.

“Last night? Why? I… Well we met Jackie, and after that nothing happened,” she recalled, then furrowed her brows. “No, hold on. I wanted you to go to sleep, right? But then…  _ Oh god _ . It was real?  _ He _ was here?” Rose’s eyes widened in horror. The Doctor nodded in melancholy.

“Do you remember anything else, though?” Rose blinked and looked around, seeming to think hard. Her expression turned somewhat foul as she declared: “Yeah. You were rude to me.” The Doctor grimaced at that. He regretted snapping at her. It was his own fault anyway. Rose had only tried to warn him about the gun. Now wasn’t the time for an apology, though.

“And what about… after he shot me?” he probed, examining Rose’s face carefully. Rose jerked and tried to get up, face full of worry.

“He  _ shot _ you?! Oh my god, Doctor, are you‒”

“No, Rose, it’s okay, I’m okay! Please, don’t get up yet, you suffered a massive short circuit not even six hours ago. I need you to lie down for now, yeah?” the Doctor rushed in, gently pushing Rose down once again. Her expression was full of mixed emotions. The Doctor could see flashes of anger, confusion, worry, and gold behind her eyes. He didn’t know if he’d just imagined the last one, but it frightened him nonetheless.

“‒But you said he…” Rose began, only to trail off.

“And he did,” the Doctor replied calmly. “Try, that is.”

“Well what happened?” Rose asked, impatient. She was apparently tired of the Doctor being his mysterious, suspensive self. He smiled softly as he looked at Rose’s perplexed eyes.

“You did,” he said.

“Me?” Rose asked in surprise, eyes widening. “Did I take the bullet? Wait… is that why I had the black-out thingy?”

“More or less. Welll… I don’t really know myself what happened. But you, Rose… You saved my life. Stopped the bullet, or rather, something inside you did,” the Doctor tried to explain, looking back at the horrifying event with newfound perspective. She had been terrifying. But she had looked absolutely beautiful, like a goddess. “You just stopped it, like frozen in time. It was unbelievable. I’ve lived my whole life believing in science and physics but not once have I seen something like that happen.” Rose’s expression was unreadable.

“I don’t get it. How was I able to do that?” she asked. The Doctor shrugged and looked down at his empty hands, feeling the urge to take her hand in his.

“You started glowing: it was so bright it hurt to look at you. You weren’t yourself, really. You claimed to be ‘the Bad Wolf’,” he revealed, looking back at Rose.

“Bad Wolf?” Rose repeated, voice quiet. “I don’t know what that is.” She frowned.

“Neither do I. I mean, I do think it’s some sort of virus. My computer recognises it as a virus. It is no ordinary hack, though,” the Doctor said. “If it expands outside the virtual dimension, it’s got to be something more powerful.”

“I don’t like it,” Rose whispered, lying down next to the sitting Doctor. He breathed deep and nodded.

“I don’t, either. It’s clearly what Saxon is after. He…” the Doctor paused, “I think he mentioned something about becoming your Master. The Bad Wolf’s, that is.”   
“Sounds shady,” Rose commented.

“Yeah,” he replied. “Maybe he aspires to control that thing inside you. He does seem a bit mad so that wouldn’t be out of the question. As your previous owner, he must’ve triggered that thing before.” Rose listened to the Doctor speak quietly, twisting her hands anxiously. Finally her hand found its place in his, making the twitching stop.

“I don’t get why he’d abandon me if I was valuable to him, tho’,” Rose said. The Doctor didn’t know the answer to that either. Maybe he hadn’t been the one to abandon Rose in the scrapyard after all. But that wouldn’t line up with all the other things. As the silence stretched, only their linked hands gave them comfort.

“Can you remove it?” Rose asked timidly, breaking the silence.

“Remove it?” the Doctor repeated, looking down at Rose. She looked troubled.

“The thing. From inside me. If someone put it in there, then you must be able to remove it somehow, yea’?”

“That’s not how it works, Rose,” the Doctor sighed.

“Then tell me how it works,” she shot back, impatient. The Doctor couldn’t believe he was about to go into android science and anatomy right now with an actual android.

“It wasn’t put into you,” the Doctor corrected. “As far as I know, that thing is a part of you. It has always been a part of you since the moment you were created, and I don’t mean your physical form, I mean your chip. You know, the thing that determines who you are; your personality, memories, potential… everything.”

Rose frowned deep, displeasure imminent on her face: “I don’t get it. What do you mean, ‘it wasn’t put into you’? Then how the heck is it there in the first place?”

“Well, remember when I talked about the strange anomalies in your base code? The same code that isn’t created by any human but actual machines; machines no one can control? I think that is what the anomalies were. They are entwined in your coding, a.k.a in your very own DNA, so to speak. No human being could’ve tampered with that. Not even I know how deep the technology of today goes.” Rose’s face fell and her grip on the Doctor’s hand slackened. She closed her eyes.

“So, removing it would mean…”

“...destroying your whole chip, the thing that essentially is you. Yeah.” The Doctor felt sick even saying it. Again, he had no absolute waterproof information, but his speculations were more than often correct. And in this case, even with the blanks, everything sort of made sense. He hated being right sometimes. “But that’s not happening. I won’t let it,” he promised, tightening his hold on the android’s hand.

This time when Rose tried to sit up, the Doctor didn’t stop her. He gently helped her sit upright, wrapping his free arm around her. Rose looked exhausted. She fell heavily against the Doctor, burying her face in his shoulder as much as she could, hair falling over her face. Her deep, hopeless sigh was the most heartbreaking sound the Doctor had heard in a long time.


	8. Seventh chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *gasps upon seeing the illustration* What’s happening? 8)  
> Beta + immense brainstorming help that made this chapter even possible by @wordsintimeandspace and necessary love and support by @starlightkissedsmiles. Go check them out!

 

Rose had been acting differently ever since the incident with Saxon. He would occasionally catch Rose watching him with a concerned look on her face, but every time she’d quickly smile and come to hug him. Not that he complained. It was still easy to tell something deep down was bothering the android. They hadn’t made any progress on finding out what Bad Wolf was, either. The only thing the Doctor knew for sure was that Saxon had to be kept far away from Rose.

Saxon hadn’t reappeared after the fateful night. It was clear, however, that the man wasn’t about to give up. The Doctor did think it was a bit odd that they’d heard nothing of him. It just made it much more frustrating.

 

\--------------------------

 

It was Friday, almost a week after the Bad Wolf scene. The Doctor walked in the kitchen, finding Rose reading a cooking book, chewing on her lower lip. She had always been fascinated with cooking despite not having to eat any food herself. The Doctor remembered how much of a bad cook she was: cooking when you don’t know how any of the ingredients taste together is quite the disaster. When she’d tried to cook the Doctor breakfast, the pancakes had ended up being terrible since instead of sugar, Rose had used baking powder. She hadn’t attempted cooking for him after that.

“Hullo,” the Doctor greeted in his usual energetic manner upon seeing Rose. He went for the sink to wash his hands. Rose cocked her head up from the book, licking her lips.

“Oh hi, I was just readin’ the…” she trailed off, lifting the book in her hands to show the cover.

“Yes, I saw. Not considering cooking, are you?” the Doctor asked, looking back at her with a teasing smile. Rose huffed, looking back at the book.

“We both know that’s not why I’m reading this,” Rose quipped defensively. “I was just looking at the recepies ‘cause they’re, you know, pretty interestin’ and all.”

“I was just joking,” he replied as he dried off his hands, then walking up to Rose’s seat and touching her shoulder. She tensed the slightest bit before quickly relaxing under his touch.

“I know…” Rose mumbled in response, ducking her head. The Doctor caught a glint of red on her cheeks and smiled gently, squeezing her shoulder before reluctantly letting go. A somewhat awkward silence fell in the room as the Doctor stayed in place for a moment too long, making it apparent he was thinking of saying something. Which he was, of course.

“Rose?” he asked.

“Yeah?”

“I’ve been noticing… I mean, I’ve gotten the feeling you’ve been… maybe avoiding me a bit,” he said, swaying from one foot to another.   
“I have?” Rose asked, raising her head from the book but not turning around to face him.

“I mean, not physically, just… I can tell something’s bothering you, and I don’t like seeing you so troubled all the time,” the Doctor corrected. Rose being bothered by something and not telling him why made his discomfort much worse. Of course she had the right to have her own secrets, but he suspected it had something to do with Saxon. The Doctor was a goner at this point, there was no denying it. He would do anything to make Rose smile again. He wanted to permanently take all her worries away.

“Oh, I…” Rose began, setting the book aside. She twisted her hands anxiously in her lap. “It’s stupid,” she settled on. The Doctor frowned.

“I’m sure it’s not,” he argued, taking a chair beside Rose and sitting down, trying to meet her eyes. He offered the android his hand, and was glad to feel her warm palm sliding along his. The contact brought reassurance to both, assuring them that even if they had secrets, there wasn’t a wall between them.

“...I’ve been thinking about leaving,” Rose said. The Doctor’s breath got caught in his throat, paralyzed.

“Leaving? Bu… where? Why?” he asked, confused, his grip around Rose’s hand tightening unconsciously.

“Away. To… to keep you safe.” The Doctor’s heart was hammering against his chest madly, fear settling in.

“‘Cause I’m the reason  _ he _ broke in here. And I’m the reason he…”  _ The reason Saxon had tried to shot him. _

“Rose, that’s not what I‒” Emotion welled up in the Doctor’s throat, breaking his sentence.

“I know,” she answered, looking down. “But don’t you see? As long as I’m in here, you’re in danger.”

“I do,” he answered, gripping Rose’s wrist tight. She looked up to face the Doctor’s grim face. “But I don’t care about that. In fact, I couldn’t care less. We’re in this _ together, _ ” he said, emphasising his last word.

“I... “ Rose bit her lip, looking down again and shaking her head. “‘S not possible. I feel so guilty already for putting you in this position.” The Doctor grew desperate. Was Rose really leaving? She… she couldn’t. He was downright miserable without her. He was…

“Please, stay. I can’t lose you. I’d honestly rather lose my… my life than see you go just because I could be in danger,” the Doctor persisted, unconsciously tightening his grip on Rose’s hands even further, to the point where it probably hurt a bit. He knew he couldn’t force her to stay against her will but he wasn’t about to let her go because she felt guilty for something that wasn’t her fault.

“I can’t lose you. You’re too important to me. Rose, I… I  _ l _ …” the Doctor struggled to get the words out, but they didn’t come. He would scare her away with this alone. He wasn’t worthy.

“You… what?” Rose asked, now looking straight at the Doctor and listening. Her eyes were no longer as guilt-ridden, but they were equally desperate, waiting. The moment between them had quickly spiralled into something completely different. The Doctor’s grip on Rose’s hand slackened a bit and he swiped his thumb across her palm. Had he not been so worked up, he would have noticed the way Rose shivered at the touch.

“...I won’t let you go over this, Rose. You’re stuck with me.”

Rose’s gaze dropped momentary. She’d been expecting something different. Deep down the Doctor knew what she had wanted to hear, what he’d been about to say all along. But he was such a coward. Always coward, him. Any day.

“Stuck with you… huh?” Rose repeated after a while, looking at their hands, her head ducked. The Doctor could see a hint of a shy smile on Rose’s lips. “That’s not so bad,” she whispered. The Doctor’s heart swelled at her words.

“...Yeah?” he asked, voice giving out the hope he felt.

“Yeah,” Rose nodded, slowly turning her head up to look at the Doctor. It was mesmerising, looking into her eyes. Almost electric, but so soft and warm and inviting and…

His gaze dropped involuntarily to Rose’s lips. God, she was so close. Why hadn’t he realised before how close their faces were? Oh, she was glancing down at his mouth, too. Just a peek, a mutual understanding.

Was he dreaming? Could he lean just a bit closer, just to see if it was real?

Oh, she was leaning closer, too. The Doctor’s heart skipped a beat, his face so close to Rose’s that he could feel the subtle warmth of her skin radiating between them. Just a bit more and…

Both jumped apart as the doorbell rang, unexpected, breaking the building tension. An awkward silence returned between them, both faces flaming red as they avoided the other’s gaze.

“I’ll get it,” Rose cried out, scrambling up and hurrying out of the kitchen, face burning and breath heaving. The Doctor was left sitting there, trying to process the events that just happened.

 

The Doctor had never been more displeased to have Jackie Tyler visit them out of the blue. He couldn’t believe he had almost kissed Rose - if it wasn’t for Mrs. Tyler and her bloody shepherd's pie.

“Thought I’d come say hi to the pair of you,” Mrs. Tyler said as the Doctor walked towards the door held open by Rose. Cold air was pouring in from outside, making the hairs on his manly hairy hands stand up. Rose had wrapped her arms around her torso, leaning against the door and listening to Jackie talk with an awkward smile on her face. The older woman had picked out the worst possible moment to interrupt them.

“You comin’ inside?” Rose asked after Jackie had told them the latest gossip and handed over the pie.

“God, no, I was just passing by. I’ve actually got to get going, love,” she answered with a wave of her hand.

“Oh,” Rose exclaimed. The Doctor couldn’t make out if she was disappointed or relieved.

“See you, dear! And you too, John. I can see you lurking over there,” Mrs. Tyler called out, looking at the Doctor who was standing in the corridor.

“See you,” he said awkwardly, almost startled by the attention. Rose was looking back at him with the pie in her hands. When she turned back, Jackie had already left. Rose shuffled around and closed the door. A silence fell in the corridor as they just stood there, Rose with the pie in her grip.

“...So. A pie, yeah?” the Doctor began, nervously shifting from one foot to another. Rose stared at the pastry with a blank expression.

“Yeah.”

“Do you think‒,” he began, but was cut off by a sudden blur of movement and Rose’s lips on his.

It was brief, warm, and there was a pie between them, but it was the most perfect sensation the Doctor had ever felt. Rose’s lips were soft yet slightly chipped where she had bit on them, something so human for someone who was not even near that. His body might have been frozen in place from shock, but his lips did return the pressure almost instantly on contact.

The kiss was over in a flash, Rose leaning back far too soon, eyes hazy and locked with the Doctor’s. The Doctor himself could only stare at her, her beauty and her sweetness, the unexpectedness of it… No words were said, but he wouldn’t have trusted himself to say anything anyway. Rose looked just as breathless as he felt despite the fact that the kiss lasted only mere seconds. She licked her lips which then curved into a small smile, and the Doctor couldn’t help but smile back, brain madly buzzing with energy. Fingers readjusting around the rim of the pie, Rose then ducked her head sheepishly and hurried off past him.

The Doctor had never been more pleased to have Jackie Tyler visit them out of the blue.

 

\--------------------------

 

Neither of them brought up the kiss afterwards. They both were obviously very aware of it, and knew the other was aware of it, but no words were said. Instead, they talked about everything else as if the kiss had never happened.

It had happened, though, and it could be seen in the way their hugs lingered or in the way Rose’s smile was just a bit softer and her cheeks just a bit redder when their eyes met. And the Doctor was fine with that. He knew deep down that they would have to bring it up at some point, but right now he was just madly in love with Rose and finally admitting it to himself. He didn’t have the courage to say it out loud, but maybe he didn’t need to. She knew, she had to.

“You’ve been sitting in one place for hours. You could use a walk,” Rose said, coming behind the Doctor after he had been sitting in front of his workbench for the whole day, tinkering.

“What? No I don‒ nngghh,” the Doctor trailed off as Rose took him by the shoulders and applied a good amount of pressure, massaging his stiff back. “Point taken.”

“Mmhm,” Rose hummed knowingly.

“You coming with?” he asked, turning back to look at Rose who was smiling smugly.

“‘Course I am. If you want me to, that is.”

“Obviously I do,” the Doctor exclaimed as if it was self-evident. Rose laughed.   
“Wanna go now? The weather’s really nice,” she suggested.

“I don’t see why not.” He smiled in return, taking the hand she was offering and got up.

 

\--------------------------

 

The weather was indeed nice, just as Rose had said. It was chilly and most of the leaves had already abandoned the trees, leaving them naked and blanketing the pavements instead. The sun was shining brightly through a thick veil of fog that surrounded everything, making New London look like a place from a children’s book. As they strolled through Hyde Park hand in hand and breath puffing out in faint clouds, the Doctor thought he had never felt more at peace. It was nice to forget all their worries for a while and just enjoy the brisk air of autumn, noses red from the cold and feet pleasantly sore from walking.

They eventually neared the park’s end, crossing the street and deciding to head out to a café to warm up. From the corner of his eye, the Doctor saw a black SUV with tinted windows park near them. For some reason, the presence of the car made him feel on the edge. He saw Rose noticed it too. She seemed troubled by it, an apprehensive look crossing over her face. Wordlessly, they hastened their pace to reach the coffee shop sooner.

“Is this place, you know… android-friendly?” Rose asked in a low voice as they sat down on a corner table. The Doctor nodded reassuringly, pointing at the person behind the counter.

“I’ve been here before. The owner is a cyborg and they don’t really give a damn on who their customers are,” he said.

“A cyborg?” Rose repeated, confused.

“An android with a human brain,” the Doctor explained. “Unlike androids, cyborgs have a slightly better status in society because they were humans once, usually turned into cyborgs after a major injury or illness.”

“Oh,” Rose answered, looking at the curly haired salesperson and smiling. ”Good for them.”

“Are you going to order something?” she continued with a question. “Can’t be very polite just to sit here without buying anything, don’t you think?”

“Right, of course,” the Doctor realised, standing up. “You want something?” Rose frowned at his offer, confused.

“But androids don’t eat. It’ll damage my system or something, you said.”

“Oh, yes, organic food will do that, but you are able to consume holographic food,” the Doctor exclaimed happily.

“Hold on. I’ve lived with you for weeks ‘n weeks and you’re just  _ now  _ telling me this?” Rose asked, not really angry as much as baffled.

“Welll…” he answered while rubbing the bridge of his nose sheepishly. “It’s not actual food, per se, they’re sort of data capsules you can consume to get the feeling and taste of a food. They’re not actually nurturing or fill you up or anything.”

“Still, waited this long to tell me about it?” Rose raised her eyebrows. The Doctor blushed. He had genuinely forgot about it. Holographic food was something fairly recent - invented by cyborgs who missed the taste of food they weren’t able to eat in their robotic shells - and it wasn’t something every place had. Since androids didn’t actually need food to survive, the Doctor hadn’t thought about Rose maybe wanting to experience the taste of food. He wasn’t a good eater anyway, so maybe that explained why he’d forgotten about it.

“Can I make it up to you by getting you some?” the Doctor asked, nodding at the menu plastered on the wall. Rose smiled at him, not really mad. Her expression turned thoughtful as she read the menu, weighing her options.

“I’d like to try the  _ ‘pear muffin’ _ ?” she suggested hesitantly. The Doctor was appalled:   
“ _ Pears?! _ Rose, you mustn’t! Pears are disgusting!” Rose rolled her eyes.

“Well, chocolate pastry, then. Oh, and chips. Chips sound good,” she nodded confidently. The Doctor chuckled, nodding.

“Your wish is my command,” he announced with a wink before walking up to the salesperson and giving their orders.

 

The coffee shop had been charming, but the duo’s light mood vanished as soon as they exited the café and noticed the same black car still in place. The Doctor could’ve sworn he’d seen the car follow them on their walk earlier, and while he didn’t want to seem paranoid, he was pretty sure he was right.

To make sure, the Doctor took Rose’s hand and tugged her in his direction. She followed him without asking any questions, but the Doctor sensed she was confused. They walked along a narrow sideway for minutes, crossing through some courtyards. When the two reached Bond Street, the Doctor saw the black car turn around a corner, slowing to a standstill roughly fifty feet away from them. A quick glance to the license plate revealed it was indeed the same SUV.

“I think we’re being followed,” the Doctor whispered in the android’s ear.

“I… I’ve noticed it too,” she answered with a lowered voice. “Do you think it’s…?” The Doctor shrugged, forcing himself to not look back.   
“Could be.” Rose looked pale, her gaze burning into the wet pavement before them. She was so clearly upset, but the Doctor didn’t know what to say to make her feel better. There was no telling what was going through her mind.

“Let’s go home,” Rose said, voice not betraying any emotion she may be feeling. The Doctor nodded, taking the AI’s hand and walking them towards the nearest Tube station. Maybe the walk hadn’t been a good idea after all.

 

\--------------------------

 

The unsure atmosphere persisted after the Doctor and Rose had returned to his workshop. Rose was tense and she was acting strangely, and the Doctor didn’t blame her. Both of them knew who had been following them. It couldn’t be just a coincidence.

It had been a while, though, and Rose was still jumpy and on edge. The Doctor walked to her, to hug her and tell her it was all going to be okay. Saxon wouldn’t get her, not as long as he was alive and breathing.

“Rose?” he asked, reaching out to lay his hand on her arm. Rose turned around, startled, but her expression quickly morphed into a more welcoming one. Still, her gaze held a look of remorse every time she looked at the Doctor.

“Hm?”

“I was just thinking we could maybe do something nice together. To forget what happened earlier outside,” he suggested. For a moment, Rose appeared surprised. Then her face fell and a sad smile formed on her face, a smile that wavered the slightest bit. It was like she knew something he didn’t. He knew better than to push her, though.

“Yeah, that sounds good,” Rose nodded after a while, the sadness passing from her face a tad too fast. Suddenly, she was very excited, too excited, about doing something. “We could watch a movie! I’ve not seen the Lion King and you keep talking about it.” The Doctor was swept away in a blur of excitement. She really wanted to watch that with him?

“Why don’t you go put it on while I’ll make us somethin’ to snack on while watching,” Rose offered, smiling wide. The Doctor nodded, enthusiastic. He couldn’t believe his plan worked.

Before he took off to the bedroom, Rose tugged on his arm and hugged him tight. “Don’t forget the blankets,” she added with a tongue-touched grin.

“I won’t!” he exclaimed as he went on to the bedroom and crouched over a nightstand. He started going through all the old movies he had, looking for his favourite, when suddenly a thought hit him, a defect in their earlier conversation.  _ Wait. _

“Rose?” he called, frowning. He stood up, walking out of the room and peeking into the kitchen with the Lion King cover in his hand. “Rose? You do remember you can’t eat though, righ…” he trailed off.

The kitchen was empty.

He felt a cool breeze on the side of his face and looked around frantically, panic rising in him. That is, until he noticed the post-it on the kitchen table. It was Rose’s handwriting, only one word.

_ Sorry. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *gasp* A c-cliffhanger???????


	9. Eighth chapter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "In my dreams she keeps walking away. I see her in my dreams. In my dream I keep asking a girl where to find [a perfect rose] and she is dressed in the most immodest way. She will not answer me, and she keeps walking away.  
> In my dreams I keep asking a girl where to find one and she is dressed in the most immodest and extraordinary way. She will not answer me, and she keeps walking away…" - Tenth Doctor's diary, Doctor Who season 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We’re nearing the end, friends. Bear with me, please, even as it gets dark. Special thanks to my beta @wordsintimeandspace, and to @starlightkissedsmiles who compared this chapter to doomsday but still supported me through the angst. May this be your warning, my dear readers. <3  
> Oh, and yeah, this is the lengths they go. They go pretty far. (reference to the story summary)
> 
> CW: Cursing, Character death (non-permanent), animal death, brief description of violence

 

_ Sorry. _

Rushing through the familiar street, the Doctor’s mind kept flashing back to the note Rose had left behind.  _ Sorry _ . As in, sorry, Doctor, but I can’t risk you. He knew exactly what Rose must’ve been thinking, and he also knew it was a huge mistake. Saxon had clearly not given up and that could only mean that he had something up his sleeve. A trap, maybe.

_ Sorry. _

It felt almost ironic, running blindly down the street. Running after the woman he loved. Again. Rose couldn’t be far, she had five minutes’ advance at most. However, he lived in a suburban area with narrow streets and forgettable street names. Five minutes was a lot of time for an android who was determined and had the advantage of never getting out of breath.

The Doctor had officially abused his lungs to their extreme by the time he reached the biggest junction of his neighbourhood. He was forced to stop to gather his breath and fight the feeling of burning nausea from exercising his non-athletic body over its limits. Looking around, breath heaving, the Doctor spinned around, trying to catch a glimpse of any blonde haired person. The bus stops were full of people on both sides of the road, but none of the people waiting looked like Rose. A lone taxi had parked beside the bus stop on his side, blinker flashing steadily to indicate it was waiting for a customer. Rose was nowhere nearby, though.

“Bollocks,” the Doctor cursed under his breath, desperation welling up inside him. He grasped his sweaty hair in his hands, forcefully pulling the locks.  _ Think, think, think… _

“Did you see that  _ droid _ going down the street alone?”

The Doctor’s head perked up at the comment. He turned around, looking for the source of the voice.

“Yeah, ‘s like it didn’t even have a owner. What an ungrateful bundle of wires,” another voice replied. This time the Doctor located the source: They were two men, assumably in their twenties, waiting for the bus under a tree.

“Excuse me,” the Doctor spoke up, stepping closer. “Who are you talking about?” The couple leered at him, weighing him under their gazes. The Doctor tapped his foot on the ground nervously, energy and the need to run sizzling inside him. Finally, the taller one of the two opened his mouth:

“That blonde machine that walked by just now.” The man’s degrading words made the Doctor’s blood boil, but he wasn’t about to start a fight now when these people had possibly spotted his Rose.

“In what direction?” The tall one seemed annoyed and instead of answering he only nodded behind him. “H-how’d you know it was an android?” the Doctor questioned, his brain nagging at him, telling him that every nanosecond he wasted still had him further away from Rose. The short one shrugged and spit on the ground.

“It’s fucking freezing and it only had a tank top on. Plus you could see all the machine bits in its arms and back. Why? It yours or something?”

“No, well, in a way I know her… But… Goodbye,” the Doctor stuttered, hope inflating him as he darted off to the direction they had pointed at. Was he too late?

 

\--------------------------

 

By some sort of miracle, he wasn’t too late.

At least the men hadn’t been leading him on. As the Doctor rounded the corner, he saw Rose just as she was entering a very familiar black SUV. Her name was left frozen on his lips as he realised it was too late to call after her. The car was already pulling off, Rose inside it.  _ Fuck.  _ Without missing a beat, the Doctor rushed back to the bus stop.

“Come on, I need you to follow that car,” the Doctor nearly shouted as he inserted himself into the taxi he’d spotted earlier. The person behind the driving wheel was genuinely confused.   
“But… sir, I was called here by–”

“I don’t care! It could be the bloody Queen of the England and I still wouldn’t care - I’m going to pay you double everything. Just. Follow that car,  _ please _ . Now!” The driver didn’t need to be told twice.

The Doctor noticed his palms were sweating more as his anxiety grew. Rose had left because she thought she put him in danger. She probably wanted to face Saxon alone, the stupid, brave girl. Foolish. He… He loved her, there was no denying it. He’d gone and fallen in love with an AI. There must’ve been several laws against that, but the Doctor didn’t care in that moment. Going to prison was the least of his troubles right now.

“Sir, I lost the sight of the car,” the driver piped up nervously. Crap. The Doctor looked around, trying to spot the black SUV. When he didn’t find it, he started panicking all over again.

Had Saxon noticed the taxi following? Was Saxon himself even in the car? Was Rose safe? No, obviously not. He had to…

“Oh, there it is. Sorry, sir. You still want me to follow them?”

The Doctor released a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. His heart was hammering madly from the stress, relief flooding his system.

“Yes. Yes, yes, follow them. Please,” he nodded rapidly. His nerves were getting the best of him. If something happened to Rose now…

“I think the car is stopping,” the driver observed, bringing the Doctor back to reality.

“Wh… what?”

“The car. It pulled over. Do you want me to drive closer, or–”   
“NO. Here is good, thank you,” the Doctor said forcefully, gaze never leaving the black car up ahead. The doors of the car opened and Saxon, accompanied by Rose, exited the vehicle out of his line of sight. A quick glance at his surroundings revealed that they were in some sort of alleyway. A shady place for shady business. Seemed about right.

“Cash or electrochip?” the driver asked, running him up, oblivious to what was happening.

“I… Cash. Cash, yeah, here…” the Doctor answered, distracted, shoving a pile of cash in the driver’s direction. It was certainly way too much for the trip, but the Doctor frankly didn’t care.

“Keep the rest. Thanks,” he said as he climbed out of the taxi, beginning to walk over to the black SUV. He could feel his own heart beat so loud he was afraid it would give him away. As he got closer, faint noises of conversation could be heard.

“Just… tell me what you want from me.” It was Rose’s voice. She sounded hard as steel, but the Doctor could detect a slight waver behind her words.

“You already know what I want,” Saxon’s voice retorted. The Doctor forced himself to stop behind the corner to not reveal himself. He leaned against the worn out brick wall, gaze straying to a dirty street dog sleeping opposite to him.

“I don’t. I want to know the truth. I want to know why you’re doing all of this,” Rose said. There was a brief silence. “Well?”

“What would I get for telling you the truth?” Saxon asked. “And how would it benefit you,  _ Rose _ ?” He was clearly suspicious.

“I have no memory of you ever owning me, so obviously I’m concerned. If… If I… helped you,” Rose sounded like she was forcing the words out, “I would need to know the whole truth. Everything.”

“And why would you just turn yourself in?”

“To keep the Doctor out of this,” Rose answered without missing a beat. “To keep him safe.”

The Doctor couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Did Rose really know what she was getting herself into? And why? Just so that he would be safe? The Doctor almost stepped up right then, but Saxon’s laugh stopped him in his tracks.

“Aww,” Saxon giggled, “how sweet. How positively  _ adorable, _ ” he drew out with a sickeningly sweet voice. The Doctor’s skin crawled at his voice.

“Very well,  _ Rose _ . You seem genuine enough. Oh, what people do for love,” Saxon mused. “I do admit throwing you away was a mistake on my part. I should’ve made sure the copy I made of your chip had the virus in it before getting rid of you. My bad. Turns out copying your chip’s data doesn’t transfer the virus inside you.”

“W-wait, so… You never wiped my… You have my memories?”

“Oh, not only your memories. I took a full backup of you. I took it to extract the virus out of you, to use it in my own purposes… sadly, though, the copy is useless. It has no value to me. You, however…”

“H…hold on. Stop, don’t come any closer, Saxon,” Rose’s voice was suddenly afraid, even as she tried to keep it hard and intimidating. The Doctor could hear footsteps against the concrete ground. Rose was in danger.

“It’s Master to you,  _ Rose. _ You know the truth now. Time for me to claim my part of the deal - and just in time for your precious Doctor to see,” Saxon scorned, startling the Doctor. Saxon knew he was here? Oh, _ fu…  _

“Wh… what?” Rose asked, panicked, whirling around just as the Doctor rounded the corner into the dead-end alleyway.   
“Rose, watch ou–” The Doctor was unable to finish his sentence. Saxon had already stepped behind Rose, grabbing her head and pulling out something from his pocket. Rose let out a terrified shriek as Saxon forcefully plugged a flash drive into the USB port in her neck.

The Doctor could only watch, frozen in horror as gold flooded Rose’s eyes, bright light forcing itself out of her. Rose’s lips were open in a silent scream, her hands struggling to rip the flash drive out. It was too late, though. The damage had already been done.

“What did you do?!” the Doctor demanded, voice broken, accusing. Saxon was smiling smugly, ignoring him completely.

“Hello, my Wolf,” Saxon greeted the golden being. Rose, now completely consumed by the virus, turned to look at Saxon, silent. A small part of the Doctor hoped the Wolf would rip Saxon’s head off. He wouldn’t try to stop her this time.

“Hello, Master.” The echoing voice resembled Rose’s so closely it hurt, but it wasn’t her. It lacked the emotion, the passion, the feeling. It was dull, one of a programmed robot.

“What the  _ hell _ did you do to her?!” the Doctor all but shouted. This time he really gained Saxon’s attention.

“What do you mean, Doctor Smith?” Saxon asked, inclining his head to the side. “You mean–” Saxon continued, plugging the flash drive off of Rose, “–this?” The Doctor didn’t answer, not wanting to play his game.

“Well, I simply made a small addition to her code,” Saxon said, unprompted. “Basically, Doctor, I overrode her system. I am her Master now.” Saxon threw the flash drive behind him, not needing it anymore. The code had already been applied.

The Doctor turned his attention to Rose, whose eyes were swirling with bottomless gold and power, whose face was slack and emotionless. This wasn’t the almighty Wolf he’d seen. This was a Wolf caught in chains, beaten and forced into submission.

“Rose?” he called gently. Her eyes didn’t light up in recognition. She just stared through him, blank. The Doctor could feel his heart shatter. He blinked to stop the tears from spilling over. Was this it? Was it all over?

“Why now?” the Doctor asked, trying to cover the hurt in his voice. “Why not then?” He wanted answers, more than Rose had received.

“Well, the code wasn’t ready back then. And you two caught me by quite the surprise. Now, though…” Saxon trailed off, turning to look at Rose and gently brushing the android’s cheek with the back of his hand. The Doctor swallowed the urge to attack Saxon just for touching Rose when she was unable to say no. “Let’s show him what you’re made of, shall we, Wolf?”

“Yes Master,” the Wolf answered in monotone. A voice inside the Doctor cried for her, for her to snap out of it, for her to recognise him and stop complying to Saxon. A wiser part of him knew, though, that she was unable to. Whatever Saxon had inserted into her was powerful, and it had clearly forced out a tamed version of the Bad Wolf to do his bidding.

“I don’t like that dog. Destroy it,” Saxon said dismissively, nodding towards the dog the Doctor had seen earlier. It didn’t even take two beats as Rose simply raised her hand and turned her wrist. Horrified, the Doctor watched as the dog woke up, letting out a high-pitched howl of agony, before turning golden and bursting into sparkling dust. It descended onto the colourless asphalt; Gone, just like that. The only trace left of the dog was the pile of dust, now slowly melting into the wind.

A cold tear stuck in his eyelashes, the Doctor turned back to look at Saxon. The man was grinning like a maniac whereas Rose’s gaze held nothing, no remorse. In that moment the Doctor knew she wasn’t really there, that she couldn’t fight back even if she wanted to.

“Excellent job, Wolf,” Saxon praised. Rose’s face remained empty. “I have another task for you. You, Doctor, must know what it is,” he continued, looking pointedly at the Doctor. He swallowed, nodding with a grim expression.

It was his turn to be turned into dust.

 

\--------------------------

 

Bad Wolf had never believed in love. Such a human emotion was far below it.

For as long as it could remember, the Wolf had been alone, wandering in space. That is until its paths collided with one specific RO-53 unit from the planet Earth, in the year 2899.

Being a part of Rose meant being one with her, and she had always been, from the moment she was created, passionate about everything. From this lesser creature the Wolf learned many things it had avoided before. Love wasn’t just about the smiles exchanged or the butterflies in one’s stomach, nor was it about a lone kiss or hands held tight in the dark of the night. Love was putting someone else’s needs before yours. One’s life wasn’t exchangeable for another’s.

The Wolf noticed how very much Rose loved the Doctor. But even more importantly, the Wolf saw her love for life. And after having been a part of her for so long, things started blurring together. So, little by little, the Wolf found itself falling in love with those things as well.

When it came to the moment where Saxon told Rose to destroy the Doctor, something in the Wolf’s mind shifted. A pulling part of the beast was ready to turn everything into dust with a flick of a wrist but another part, that  _ Rose _ part of the Wolf, persisted. She had always been too compassionate for her own good, doing what was right, defying orders.

“Get rid of him.”

_ Defy. Defy. Defy. _

Images of them stranded in the scrapyard, the Wolf alone inside Rose’s deactivated mind for weeks, flashed before its eyes. Feeling all that pain and loneliness she had taught it to feel. Without Rose, the Wolf had felt helpless, even as it possessed all that power. 

The Wolf was a being of many things: A mythical beast that held all the questions and all the answers, the only one that could mold time and space and bend reality into its will. The Wolf wasn’t, however, a being made to feel. Its only link to rationality, to that insane power, had been this female android, the one that was now locked up away in their mind. Yet even locked up away the Wolf could feel Rose’s presence fighting hard to get out. Strangely, all that pointless resistance awoke something in the Wolf. A newfound feeling, an emotion it had never felt before:  _ Hope. _

_ “No,” _ it spoke up, its own voice echoing firmly and bouncing off the walls of the universe. The Wolf knew it couldn’t defy its Master’s commands for long, so it needed to be quick.

Long ago the Wolf had looked into the future and it had seen all that is, all that was, and all that ever could be. But the Wolf had never seen this. It had never seen this one android coming. It realised that maybe there was indeed a thing called love. And loving someone meant putting their needs before your own.

Knowing its time had finally come, the Wolf smiled for the final time, embracing its fate.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor stood in place, waiting for the inevitable. Staring into the depths of Bad Wolf’s ruthless eyes, prepared for everything to end.

After a while the moment between them had stretched a bit too long, though. Saxon had already given his order, yet Rose stood still. Finally:

_ “No.” _

...What?

“No?” Saxon repeated, appalled. “You can’t defy me. I told you to destroy him. Do as your Master says,  _ Wolf _ .” The Doctor stood still, shocked.

_ “I’m doing as my Master says. And  _ **_she_ ** _ is saying no.” _

With the flick of its hand, the Wolf picked up a metal pipe that was lying in the ground further away, turning it in its hands. The Doctor stared at the being in confusion, not trusting himself enough to say a word. A bittersweet smile formed on the Wolf’s lips and its gaze turned towards the Doctor, meeting his eyes. They were a good five feet apart, but he could still see the golden tear rolling down Rose’s face, getting stuck in the corner of her mouth, from where she licked it away. A fleck of whiskey brown blended in with the gold of the Wolf’s eyes as it spoke words to him, and for a moment, just a fleeting moment, the Doctor could see Rose there instead of the Wolf. Then she was gone, and the Wolf closed its eyes.

Still trying to process what the Wolf had said, the Doctor only realised what was going to happen when it was too late.

“ **NO!!!** ” It was the Master’s shout, but he, too, was far too late. Piercing her neck with the pipe, Rose slumped lifeless to the ground, her chip and the Wolf destroyed for good by the sharp, unforgiving metal.

Tears freely dropping on the pavement, her last words echoed in the Doctor’s head like an accusation:

_ “I love you. Goodbye.” _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "But Cio!" I hear them scream, "you can't end every chapter on a cliffie!"  
> "Watch me," I respond from my desk, sipping the sweet tea made of freshly wept tears.
> 
> In other words, bare with me. I promise things will get better from here.  
> On an ending note, I quote the Doctor's diary to you again:
> 
> "She judges the living and the dead  
> Everything changes as she passes  
> I know her face  
> She is so graceful  
> So powerful  
> She judges everything and everyone that she meets  
> She judges all that come in her path all and more  
> She has gold eyes the universe is inside her  
> She had the universe poured into her  
> She had the universe poured into her  
> Gold eyes  
> powerful"


	10. Ninth chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter before the epilogue. I’d like to thank all of you who have stayed with me through all this and given me positive feedback and supported me <3 You guys are the reason this story got this far.  
> Beta’d by @wordsintimeandspace. A special thanks for @starlightkissedsmiles for helping me, too.

 

It was over.

The Doctor’s knees hit the ground and he slumped over, unable to tear his eyes away from the still form of Rose. His vision blurred with big, fat tears that spilled over and dotted the cold pavement.

“R-Rose?” he called out, reaching over to the android’s limp hand. “Rose…” the Doctor croaked as she remained lifeless, grasping her hand between his and holding them against his center. He stayed like that for what felt like an eternity, completely oblivious to the outside world. His Rose was gone. She was… she was gone. And this time there was no way for him to fix her. He could fix everything except the one thing that made Rose who she was.

A grunt of pain brought the Doctor back to his senses, reminding him he had company. Oh, that was right. _Saxon._ He was responsible for all this. He would pay. The Doctor would make him pay. He gritted his teeth, shaking from the growing anger inside him.

The Doctor slowly raised his head, bloodshot eyes staring at the man who was lying on the ground. Wait. Why was he lying on the ground? The Doctor wiped his eyes on his sleeve, not letting go of Rose’s inanimate hand. It looked like he was in pain, and while the Doctor was too angry to feel even an ounce of pity for Saxon, he wondered why regardless.

“Saxon?” he asked, voice tight. The blonde man rolled around, holding his head in pain.

“Fuck… fuck, FUCK!” he groaned. The Doctor furrowed his brows, glancing back at Rose and instantly regretting doing it. The rusty metal pipe was there, pierced straight through her throat… He couldn’t stand to look at her like that. It made him physically sick, and forced him to turn his attention back to the writhing, pathetic form of Saxon. Had Bad Wolf done something to Saxon? The Doctor had been so fixated on Rose that he hadn’t seen if Saxon had been hit by something. There wasn’t any bleeding as far as the Doctor could see, so he was pretty sure that whatever Saxon was struggling with was inside his head.

Him being hurt didn’t make the Doctor feel any remorse, though. He knelt over the cursing man, gripping his collar forcefully. Saxon yelped and tried to pry himself free.

“This is your fault!” the Doctor hissed, face twisted and mind clouded by anger. “You drove her to it, you made her do it!” Saxon whined at the accusation, trying to kick the Doctor away. His grip on Saxon was too strong.

“What are you talking about? Let me go, fucker, it’s already o– aaaARRGH!” Saxon’s words were cut off by his own, pained shout.

“...Why are you hurting?” the Doctor asked, forcing himself step back a little. The blonde man was holding his head again, growling like a mad dog.

“The stupid bitc–”  
“DON’T _EVER_ CALL HER THAT!” the Doctor interrupted ruthlessly, almost crushing Saxon’s head on the hard ground.

“Why does it matter? She’s already dea–” Saxon began, but this time the Doctor actually did bang his head against the ground. Saxon’s sentence drowned behind the pained moan he let out.  
“Don’t. Say. It,” the Doctor demanded through gritted teeth, voice low and dangerous. Saxon let out a blasphemous laughter as soon as he had recovered from the hit.

“Say what? That she’s _dead_?” The Doctor pushed Saxon hard against the concrete, voice hissing as he spoke: “I told you. Not. To say it.”

“Oh, I’m sorry? Rose is dead, did you hear it this time? Your precious little plaything is de– OW! _FUCK!_ ” Saxon shouted as the Doctor’s fist connected with his face. The Doctor was panting from the sheer amount of anger and disgust he felt towards this man. Was he deliberately trying to get his ass kicked?

“Stop hitting me, _moron!_ I’m already dying,” Saxon said, spitting blood from his mouth.

“...What?” the Doctor asked with a frown, pausing. “What do you mean?”  
“I tried explaining but you just fucking banged my head on the _fucking_ ground!”

“Well you deserved it,” the Doctor replied coldly. Saxon sighed and grunted in discomfort.

“How do you think I was able to control her, smartass?” Saxon questioned, voice oozing with sarcasm.

“With the code?” the Doctor answered without a beat, confused by where this was going.

“Yeah, so you think a code would be able to identify me? My god, you’re much more stupid than I thought!” Saxon exclaimed. “Of course I have a bloody counter-chip in my brain to be able to… fucking hell, man.” Saxon tried to pry himself free again in vain.

“So you’re saying you got an actual chip there in your brain that was connected to them and now it’s just… self-destructing you? On purpose? How stupid are _you_?” the Doctor asked, getting the full picture now.

“Not on purpose. It’s her fucking fault for… hrrrgngh,” Saxon grunted, pained. Then he went totally pale. The Doctor shook him, trying to get him to continue. Then it hit him.

If Saxon died now, Rose would never get the justice she deserved.

No, no, no _no no…_

“Don’t you dare die now, Saxon! I’m not done with you yet!” the Doctor threatened, his pulse racing. Death was basically a jail-free card for this man! The Doctor shook Saxon harder, making him yelp.

“Ha… ha…” Saxon laughed, breathless. “Fuck you, _Doctor_. Seems like I’m winning after all.”

“NO! Don’t you _dare_ ,” the Doctor repeated, angry tears rolling down his cheeks. Saxon, however, didn’t hear him anymore. He grunted in pain, eyes closed.  
“The drums, _the drums…_ ” he groaned over and over, “make the drums stop, make them stop...” The Doctor could only watch as the man he so hated slowly stopped moving, slumping totally in his grip. The Doctor couldn’t feel Saxon’s pulse anymore. He was dead, killed by his own weapon.

The Doctor slowly let go of him and turned back to look at Rose before breaking down completely.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor had sat on the dead-end alleyway for a good thirty minutes. He just sat there, holding Rose’s hand and blaming himself for not being able to save her. For not being able to keep Saxon alive long enough for him to pay for his crimes. He removed the metal pipe out of Rose, not standing to see it there, reminding him of how she sacrificed herself to save the world. To save him, the brave, brave girl.

“Hey Rose,” the Doctor began after the white sound of silence began ringing too loud in his ears. His voice was hoarse from crying. “Let’s go home, yeah? I’ll fix you up in no time,” he assured, hands shaking. Seeing Rose so pale and lifeless for the third time in their time together made the Doctor feel hollow. It felt the same every time, only this time it was much worse because he knew he couldn’t bring Rose back. He couldn’t patch her up, not what was broken inside. He could bring Rose back physically but when it came to her personality, her memories… she would be just an empty shell that looked like her. More tears gathered at the corners of the Doctor’s eyes at the thought.

Picking up the android and cradling her close to his chest like a fragile little thing, the Doctor began walking to Saxon’s SUV. It was going to get them home.

The doors were unlocked and the key was still in the ignition switch. The Doctor gently laid Rose down on the back seats of the car, his slender arms already strained by the weight of her. Gently brushing back her hair, the Doctor kissed Rose’s forehead. Her words still haunted the back of his mind.

_“I love you. Goodbye.”_

The fact that she had uttered those words with a smile on her face made it hurt even more. It was like she had already accepted her fate. The Doctor swallowed, emotions welling up again. Truth to be told, he couldn’t tell how much of that had been Rose herself and how much had been the Bad Wolf speaking. The Doctor liked to believe it had been both of them, even if he hated the Wolf for essentially being the reason Rose was no longer here.

“I love you too,” he whispered shakily, looking at her peaceful face. Unable to look at Rose’s face longer, the Doctor closed the car’s door and went to take care of Saxon’s body.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor left Saxon to rot behind a dumpster in the alley. He hadn’t found much on the body anyway, just Rose’s ownership records that he did take with him. The Doctor also collected the flash drive Saxon had tossed aside for further investigation. He went through the man’s phone before smashing it on the ground in case someone was tracking it.

The whole drive back the Doctor felt a huge weight sitting on his chest. Flashes of gold kept flickering before his vision like memories, reminding him of Rose’s limp body stretched out on the backseat of the car. To distract himself, the Doctor pulled out Rose’s papers from the seat next to him and began half-mindedly reading them.

_‘Model unit: R0-53_

_Model family: R0-5__

_Serial code: 84DW01F22092899_

_Origin: The Powell Estate Factory, TPEF_ _№_ _2, New London_

_Day of purchase: 10.10.2899_

_Owner’s name: Harold Saxon’_

Reading Rose’s official records felt weird to say the least. Seeing Saxon’s name in the papers, black on white. It made the Doctor shiver. Reading and driving simultaneously wasn’t a good idea anyway. Leaving the papers aside and making a mental note to improve them later, the Doctor pulled over next to his workshop. He collected everything from the car, Rose included.  
“Here we are, Rose. Home,” the Doctor said gently, pretending she could hear him.

 

\--------------------------

 

Just as he’d promised, the Doctor did fix Rose up as much as he could. He worked on her destroyed neck night and day, making sure all the tiny wires and joints were connecting where they should. In the end, Rose looked like she always had; absolutely beautiful. Not a single scratch besides that faint scar she had on her right wrist. It was as if she was just sleeping, which of course didn’t fool the Doctor for a second since androids didn’t sleep.

“I’m so sorry, Rose,” the Doctor whispered. He couldn’t stand seeing her there, on the table, so still. Rose was no lab rat and she deserved a softer place to rest.

 _‘She’s not going to recover, Doctor. You know that, right?’_ a faint voice in the back of his head reminded. Ignoring the voice, the Doctor hooked his arms under Rose’s back and knees, picking her up and taking her to the his bedroom. She could rest on his bed - it wasn’t like he was going to use it. Not when he had to figure out a way to fix Rose.

 _‘You know you can’t fix her. Let her go,’_ the voice persisted.

“No,” the Doctor growled, fists clenched tight in denial. He smoothed the blanket over Rose before marching to his workbench and getting to work. He had to find a way to fix her.

He had to.

 

\--------------------------

 

The Doctor broke down again in the evening. He’d worked all day, digged in the darkest corners of the internet and found nothing. Nothing but confirmation that Rose was truly gone. There was no way to restore her personality, memories, anything.

The Doctor began mentally beating himself up. Why hadn’t he predicted this? Why hadn’t he taken a back-up of Rose’s chip? Why hadn’t he made sure… Wait.

“A back-up…” the Doctor mumbled to himself, frowning. “A back-up… a _copy_ …”

What if he did have a copy?

The Doctor scrambled up and ran to the SUV parked outside as fast as he possibly could, desperate. _Saxon had a copy of Rose’s chip. Saxon had a copy of Rose’s chip. He’d overheard it in Saxon and Rose’s conversation. Saxon had taken a_ **_backup_** _._ It wasn’t in the same flash drive as Saxon’s corruption drive which he had used to override Rose’s system, but it had to be somewhere.

The Doctor kept rampaging through the black SUV in a frenzy, turning over every seat and locker and bag there was. He was so desperate, so desperate. Almost hopeful. He opened the locker next to the steering wheel, pulling out everything inside it. He discovered a car manual, a bunch of useless medical records that had nothing to do with Rose, and a half empty whiskey bottle. Nothing useful, then. The Doctor had checked everything. Window shades, under the seats, Saxon’s personal briefcase for God’s sake… Nothing. Saxon didn’t have it in his car. Bollocks.

The Doctor climbed out of the car, defeated. He took the car’s keys to lock the doors when his eyes suddenly settled on the key charm dangling from the keys. Only, it wasn’t a key charm. It was a micro-flash drive.

_“R0-53 backup data 08/22”_

The Doctor’s heartbeat sped up. It had been right in front of him all along. A relieved, shaky laugh escaped the Doctor’s mouth. He could fix her! He could… he could transfer all the data to an undamaged chip and install it in Rose and she would be okay! She would be just like she’d always been! They could have a clean start, he wouldn’t lie this time...

...Well. The Doctor’s smile fell a bit as he realised one thing.

Rose wouldn’t remember him anymore. She would only have all her memories of the time she spent with Saxon, since that’s when the back-up had been taken. And there was no way to tell what monstrosity he had put her through.

Not quite the clean start, after all.

 

\--------------------------

 

 _‘Do you really want to do it?’_ the Doctor’s mind asked. _‘Do you really want to bring her back to a world like this? Where she would remember all the horrible things Saxon probably put her through? Aren’t you just being selfish? Aren’t you just disrespecting her choices?’_

There was no end to the questions. The Doctor had finished restoring the data to Rose’s new chip. It had taken overnight for all the data to transfer, but now the chip was ready to be put back into Rose. And she would wake up, she would be just like herself again. She would be back but she wouldn’t have any memory of their time together.

The Doctor buried his head in his hands, frustrated, Did he really want to put Rose through this again? Did he… He wanted to say those words back to her. He wanted her to know how much he… But it wouldn’t mean anything to her now, would it? She wouldn’t recognise him, she wouldn’t smile at him or say his name in that loving tone he had been trying to ignore before in his denial. He loved her. He loved her so much. But what if loving her meant letting her go? Or would she forgive him being selfish and bringing her back? He could take it, the Doctor decided. He could take Rose not remembering their time together. He could take the pain, he could do it all correctly this time. No secrets, that much he owed to her. He could be there for her, to help her heal from the times she had been under Saxon’s control now that she would remember it.

Rose had made her decision when she decided to sacrifice herself and now the Doctor was making his. And his decision was to not live a life without Rose in it.

 

\--------------------------

 

The golden, rising sun shed its light on Rose’s beautiful face through the window. The Doctor sat on the edge of his bed, holding the android’s hand and swiping his thumb against her skin. It was only a matter of time before Rose’s system would restart itself. The chip was in there, so it would be any moment now. The waiting was driving him mad. It was also making him increasingly anxious, because he knew the moment Rose’s eyes opened, she would not remember him. To her, he didn’t exist. And although that was scary, his love for this woman overcame the fear.

When the sunlight of the dawn had reached the tip of Rose’s button nose, the Doctor felt her hand twitch slightly. Oh god, it was happening. The Doctor let go of Rose’s hand, not wanting to scare her, but also holding back a new wave of tears that were a strange mix of sadness and joy. Rose sniffed in a groggy manner before her eyelids fluttered open. The Doctor’s tears spilled over at seeing the sunlight pierce Rose’s whiskey brown eyes, melting them into a colour of golden caramel. He let out a shaky breath he’d been holding, a watery laugh escaping him.

Rose’s eyebrows furrowed a bit as she began discovering her unfamiliar surroundings. However, it was only as her eyes settled on the Doctor that his heart broke completely.

“W-who… who are you?” The look of uncertainty, the hint of fear in her voice… the way her eyes looked straight at him but saw nothing but a stranger. It was probably even harder than seeing the light leaving Rose’s eyes in the alley. The Doctor instinctively lowered his head, trying to hide his sadness. He swiped away the tears, forcing himself to be happy for having Rose back.

 _‘This is a new start. Remember? You can do this,'_ the voice inside the Doctor’s head said, supportive for once. Or had it been telling the truth the whole time?

“My name’s the Doctor. I’m… I’m a friend,” he answered, looking back at the confused android with a encouraging smile. Rose seemed less scared now, but her face was still uncomfortable.

“Where’s my Master?” she asked timidly, making the Doctor’s stomach turn. “Where’s Mr. Saxon?”

The Doctor’s smile turned tight and somewhat forced as he responded: “He’s gone. He’s not coming back, I promise.” Rose frowned, licking her lips. Her demeanor was completely different from the Rose the Doctor had known, but not completely unlike the way she had been the first time they had met. And well… He had to accept that Saxon had probably had an impact on Rose’s behaviour along the years.

“So… you’re my Master now?” Rose asked, beginning to rise up from the bed and leaning on her elbows.

“What? No!” the Doctor almost shouted, making Rose flinch visibly.

“I mean… Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you. I… there’s a lot I’ve yet to tell you, love,” the Doctor said with a gentler tone, the endearment just slipping in accidentally. “But most importantly…” he continued, reaching behind him for a bunch of papers, “this is who you are now.” The Doctor gave the papers to Rose, who read them with a crease between her brows.

 _‘ ~~Model unit: R0-53~~ _ **_Name: Rose_ **

_Model family: R0-5__

_Serial code: 84DW01F22092899_

_Origin: The Powell Estate Factory, TPEF_ _№_ _2, New London_

 _~~Day of purchase: 10.10.~~ 2899 _ **_← birth year_ **

_Owner’s name: ~~Harold Saxon~~   _ **_No one but herself_ **

**_Status: The most excellent, generous, kind android on this Earth._** _'_

After a while Rose looked up from the papers, having read and seen the changes the Doctor had made to them. The Doctor awaited her reaction nervously, trying to read from the android’s blank look if she was happy or scared. A short moment passed between the two, giving Rose time to just look the Doctor in the eye as if she was trying to figure out whether or not to trust this strange man.

Then, a small smile formed on her lips, and at that moment the Doctor knew everything was going to be okay. He smiled back in the most brilliant way, eyes glistening with unshed tears.

_They were going to be okay._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, it's almost over. Just an epilogue and then we're done here. I'm really sad to see this story to come to an end since the subject and the world have been a part of my imagination for so long. This whole au is probably the most original thing I've ever created and that's why I'm sad that I can't stretch the story further. But hey, what a ride it was. <3


	11. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s time to say goodbye. This story has been one of my favourite things this whole year, and I couldn’t have made it without you all. I want to thank you for reading this and encouraging me to continue writing. It’s unclear whether this story will branch into a series or not, but for now, this is it. A wild ride, I must say. Special thanks to @wordsintimeandspace, who’s been my beta through this chapter and the whole story.

* * *

 

 

Sometimes, it was hard for Rose to let go of the past.

It was easy most of the time. She was with the Doctor now, and he treated her so well. He made sure that Rose knew she was no one’s property and did his best to make her feel at home. And she did. It was easy to forget the years she spent under her Master’s service. The things she did, the way she’d been treated… that was all in a huge contrast to how things were now.

Still, it wasn’t always as easy to escape the haunting memories, the patterns she’d learnt. She could sense the Doctor’s feelings about the matter. Every time she slipped and forgot that she didn’t actually need to serve him, he got upset. He always tried his best to conceal it, but it was no use: she always noticed. And it made her feel like she’d failed him.

So it wasn’t always easy. But she kept trying.

The Doctor told Rose many things from her past and it was confusing because it was like a big hole in her mind that had never actually been there. He told her about their time together and how kind and brave she had been. He told her everything, even when it felt like too much, so much her head would explode. There was no secrets. For some reason he was hellbent on not keeping anything from her. It was nice, but still… she felt empty. The woman he described didn’t sound like her. She just thought the Doctor missed Rose. The other Rose, the one that was gone now. The kind and brave one, not her, the withdrawn and submissive one. She could never fill her shoes, she thought. The way the Doctor looked at her when he told her about the Rose he’d known… she wasn’t here anymore. And it made Rose feel like a failure. She knew the Doctor didn’t mean to make her feel like that, but he did. And it hurt. But she let it hurt because she knew the Doctor was still mourning for what he’d lost for good.

One day the Doctor told Rose about the Bad Wolf. Rose listened to him talk, trying to comprehend everything. It sounded so bizarre, yet she knew, deep in her programming, that he was speaking the truth. She knew it because she could feel something missing, something so small you wouldn’t notice it without looking but that you couldn’t forget after finding it. She almost felt powerless without that soothing, comforting presence in the back of her mind.

It couldn’t continue forever, though. Eventually, Rose’s swallowed guilt outweighed everything else.

 

\--------------------------

 

It was a Tuesday. There was snow on the ground. The dry autumn leaves were frozen solid, glittering under the cold winter sun. The Doctor was outside plowing snow.

“Rose!” the Doctor called gleefully as he entered the workshop. Rose was inside the workshop, sitting in the corner with a dull expression on her face. She heard him shout, but she ignored him. It was too much.

“Rose!” the Doctor called again, thinking she hadn’t heard him. He was taking his shoes and his coat off, from the sound of it.

“...Rose?” The voice was closer now. There was a pause before he continued, this time clearly from behind her. She wouldn’t look at him. “Did you hear me?”

“Yeah,” Rose mumbled. Another pause.

“...Why didn’t you answer, then?”

“Because I’m not Rose.”

“What on earth are you talking about?” he asked at once. “Of course you’re Rose,” the Doctor claimed, baffled. He didn’t get it. Why would he? She shook her head quietly, closing her eyes.

“I’m not _her_ . I’m a _RO-53_84DW01F22092899_ , not _the_ Rose you’ve been telling me all about. She is gone, Doctor.” Her words were met by a dead silence. Rose didn’t dare to turn around to face him.   
“I… why are you saying this? Of course you’re her, just because you don’t remember it doesn’t mean that–”

“But it does!” Rose interrupted, more force behind her words than she could ever remember using. It almost frightened her. “I don’t recognise myself in those stories. I don’t remember all those things. I believe that they happened, but… but she is the one you miss, not me. When you look at me you see her, not me. I’m not her. If anything… I’m less than I ever was. I’m missing a part of myself.” Her words came out bitter. Not enough to sound accusing, but enough to make the Doctor take a step back. He clearly didn’t understand. Rose buried her face in her knees, fighting to keep the tear reflex from kicking in. Many people didn’t think androids were capable of crying, but those people couldn’t tell the difference between an android and a machine. Her kind was good at hiding the tears, and she didn’t want the Doctor to see. He would get upset too, more than he already was. Oh, she’d screwed up. She should’ve just been better, healed faster, connect with the stories more. Yet she hadn’t, and she was left feeling like a consolation prize. Not good enough for the Doctor who had tried to make her feel like she owed him nothing, who had taught her all these wonderful things about being free.

Truth was, though, Rose struggled with the concept sometimes. All her life she’d been under someone’s possession. She’d lived her first months in the factory before being transferred into an outlet where she’d been bought by her Master, Saxon. She had always dreamed of freedom secretly, she’d even rebelled from time to time before she’d learned it only made things worse. But now she was supposedly free to do whatever she wanted. No one was telling her to do anything. And even though it was the most wonderful thing, it was also new and weird, almost frightening. And the Doctor didn’t understand that.

How could he? He’d never been through what she had. He never asked or pushed her to talk about it, thank god. But now, after living with him for a while, she wouldn’t even mind that much. He just wanted to help her, but he was only making things worse for her. And she felt so much guilt for that.

“Rose, I…” the Doctor’s voice sounded odd. Without even looking she knew how upset he was. Without finishing the sentence, the Doctor just breathed in deeply and left the room, leaving Rose alone.

Breaking down, Rose let the tears spill over while hitting her forehead against the wall punishingly, weeping into her own empty arms.

 

\--------------------------

 

The moment the Doctor realised he could save Rose had been one of the best moments of his whole life. He’d been so desperate to bring her back that it hadn’t even mattered what the consequences were. When Rose had woken up, devoid of all her memories of their time together, it had hurt. But it had also been a moment of pure joy for him. He’d got her back. He could fix everything as long as she was at his side. Now, though…

He hadn’t expected Rose’s outburst. He thought they had been making good progress. Sure, Rose was different. She was more timid, hesitant to share her opinions. The only times he saw glimpses of her full personality was when she got excited or comfortable enough to forget all the obstacles in her mind that held her back. But she was more comfortable around him than she used to be. He knew it must’ve been hard, learning to be independent and letting go of the past, but he didn’t know what he was doing wrong. He’d never tried to pressure her into talking when she didn’t want to. He’d treated her with respect and care. He’d told her everything this time around, he hadn’t left secrets untold. Well, except one secret. The most important one, perhaps, but one he couldn’t tell her just yet in the fear of making her uncomfortable.

_‘You love her_ ,’ a compassionate voice inside his head resonated. The Doctor sighed, shaking his head. He did. He loved her so much. But he was doing something wrong. Somehow, he’d made Rose feel like she was competing with herself, like she wasn’t the real her.

Maybe… maybe she’d been right. Maybe she wasn’t actually the Rose he’d known. He’d been selfish, he realised, pushing his own agenda on Rose to make her… what, exactly? Be like herself again?  
Suddenly, the Doctor realised where he’d been going so wrong. God, he was such an idiot.

 

\--------------------------

 

“Rose?”

The android was startled by the Doctor’s sudden presence. She bit her lip, bowing her head.

“Yeah?”

“You were right. I’m sorry,” the Doctor said, much to Rose’s surprise. She felt him sit beside her. He didn’t wait for Rose to look at him before continuing. “I’ve been a complete prick. Can you accept my apology?” Rose frowned, her hands fidgeting on her lap.

“For what?”

“For being stupid,” the Doctor said. “You were right.”

“About not being her?” she asked, feeling her stomach knot.

“Yeah. You’re not her. But you’re _you._ And you’re all I want,” he told. Rose’s felt almost dizzy. She hadn’t been expecting that.

“Yeah, well, I…” she began, not knowing how to answer.

“I know you don’t believe me,” the Doctor cut in, understanding. “And that’s okay. But I want you to know that you are enough. I’m sorry I’ve been so selfish.” Rose slowly turned around to look at the Doctor. His expression was gentle. How could he be so nice to her? Rose tried hard to keep her face from crumbling.

“Were you and her…?” she asked. The Doctor smiled sadly.

“Yes. Or… it was complicated. But I left that out for a reason. I didn’t want you to feel like you owed me anything. Rose, I… I don’t care about that now. All I care about is you being happy.” The sincerity in his words made Rose’s face turn red. She was unsure of what to say. He was being so… nice. Why?

“‘S not that I don’t, y’know…” Rose mumbled, troubled. “‘S not that I don’t feel that way. I just felt like… Like you’re pining after someone else. ‘Cept that someone else is me, and… It’s just weird, yeah?” Rose looked up at the Doctor, seeing him smiling softly. “Watcha smiling at?” she asked, frowning. He laughed.

“Nothing. Just… you sounded just like yourself right then,” the Doctor said. “I know that you can’t just forget your past and I don’t think you should. I’ll never push you to tell me about it if you don’t want to. What I wish I can do in the future, though… is to get to know the real you. If you want.” Rose could almost sense how nervous the Doctor was, how hard it was for him to say these words. If Rose had learned one thing about the Doctor from the short time they’d spent together, it was that he was willing to go far out of his comfort zone to ensure her well-being. It was heartwarming. Rose smiled sheepishly, her hand inching towards the Doctor’s.  
“I think I’d like that,” she finally answered.

“...Yeah?” Rose felt the Doctor’s warm hand touch hers on the hard surface of the bench.

“Yes. And Doctor?”

“Mmhm?”

“I wish to get to know the real you, too.” At her words, the Doctor’s face lit up in the most adorable way. He beamed at her excitedly, making Rose tuck her head to hide her answering smile. Hands now entwined, the Doctor grinned, his freckled cheeks glowing.

“There’s nothing I’d like more.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is it already over? Noo.... ;___;  
> Well, final reviews? Yeah? <3


End file.
